Out of Innocence

by Adelaide McLeod

  “Hello! Hello! Who’s on the line?” Ada Prichard asked.

  “It’s Belle, Ada. I'm trying to reach Edna in Gardena.”

  “Isn’t the weather beastly? Ed put the chickens in our spare bedroom but I’m thinking it’s not much warmer there than in the hen house.”

  Belle sighed. “We’re only heating the kitchen, it’s all we can do. Please hang up Ada, I need to talk to Edna at the store.” She cranked the bell again.

  “Hello.” Edna’s shrill voice blasted in Belle’s ear.

  “Edna, have ye seen Harlow? I thought he might have gone down that way for something. It’s so bloody cold and I can’t find him.”

  “No, Belle. No one’s been in today. Are you and your younguns all right? Have you got enough wood?”

  “We’re fine,” Belle said. “Could you let me know if he happens by?"

  “I’ll call you dear, if I see him.”

  Belle stood at the window. The barn cast long purple shadows in the snow. Where the garden had been in summer, snow edged each corrugation of the furrowed, frozen ground. Spring seemed all too distant. It would be dark soon. She fed Tommy and Hannah and bedded them down on a cot pulled close to the Majestic, a head at either end. Humming a lullaby her mother sang to her when she was no bigger than Tommy, she stoked the fire and wrapped herself in blankets beside the children. The night seemed endless. A cold moon, parchment thin, straddled the mountains as the wind moaned against the ranch house.

  When the day broke and the morning sun swept across the kitchen floor, Belle felt that she hadn’t slept. But sunshine, weak as it was, made her feel better. Harlow was still missing. Sheriff Allen from Horseshoe Bend answered Belle’s call.

  “No telling what that Harlow’s up to. I’ll ask around. When the winds let up, I’ll ride up your way.”

  “Belle, so Harlow is missing?” It was Ada Prichard’s voice in the receiver.

  "Ada, dear. I’d be obliged if you’d mind your own business.” Belle put the receiver back on its hook. The last thing Belle needed right now was the neighbors knowing about Harlow’s latest escapade.

  ‘‘Are you sad, Ma?” T.J. patted her shoulder, a puppy dog look in his eyes.

  “Papa?” Hannah asked.

  “I’m all right, T.J. and the truth is, Hannah, I don’t know just where your Pa is, but he’ll be coming bye and bye.”

  “Tell us a story, Ma," T.J. pleaded.

  “Tell us a story,” Hannah mimicked.

  "All right. My Grandma Ferguson told me this story, when I was little like you.”

  As the three of them huddled together in a nest of quilts, Belle began. “Once upon a time, in a faraway place, where the sun seldom shone and nothing grew in the craggy ground, a little family lived. Besides the father and the mother, there were two children, a boy named Robbie and the girl, Eileen. Well, one day the father brought home a fine picture that he had bought from a tinker who had traveled far. The father put the picture up on the wall. The mother and the children liked the picture very much. It was a landscape of a bonnie glen with hazelnut trees, bright blue sky, a waterfall with a wee bridge in front of it, just a glimpse of the River Tay, and wooly lambs eating the grass. It was a Spartan house and the only thing of beauty in it was this lovely picture. The family would sit, just looking at it for hours. Then one day, little Eilean disappeared and her parents looked everywhere for her, and all of the people in the nearby village came to help, but they finally gave up for there was no place else to look.

  “As Eilean’s family was eating porridge that night, they noticed that there was a little girl in the picture petting the lambs. This was very strange as there hadn’t been a little girl in the picture before. It was Eilean. She smiled at them from the picture. Well, as hard as her father and mother coaxed, they could never get Eilean to come back out of the picture. Little Eilean stayed in the picture on the wall forever after.”

  “I like that story, Ma. Tell it again," T.J. said.

  "Again. Hannah chimed in.

  “I’ve work to do, now. I will tell you the story again tomorrow.”

  She held them in her arms for a long moment.

  Belle thought about her life with Harlow. What could she have done to prevent his drinking? Nothing. The only one who had the power to change Harlow was Harlow. She was determined not to go under with him. The children needed her. Was he a war casualty? Had he really died on the battlefield in France? She had to think of herself and her children now, she could no longer be pulled into his nightmare. Her life with Harlow was over. When spring came, she’d leave the ranch, she’d leave Harlow. There was no other way.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Sheriff Allen found Harlow’s body, frozen stiff, less than three hundred yards from the ranch house. Evidently, he’d walked out barefoot and coatless in the sub-zero weather and passed out. The coroner ruled his death accidental. But Belle knew it was murder. John Barleycorn had killed Harlow Pruett.

  She would get on with her life now. She’d done her mourning long ago, back in the depth of another winter. There were no tears left--she had spent them all.

  Belle Pruett: dressed in black, a widow with two children, not much more than a child herself, not yet twenty, stood by the grave of Harlow Pruett. The canyon folks came and stood beside her in the freezing wind and crusted snow. The rock-hard ground made it difficult for the grave diggers; that would cost Belle dearly. The Reverend Thomas gave the eulogy at the end of the wooden casket adorned with ponderosa branches and cones. His message was direct and simple--it was too cold to stand there long but he didn’t miss the opportunity to condemn the devil who visited Harlow Pruett disguised in a whiskey bottle. Mourners came from Utah, too. There were seven men, Harlow’s brothers: Jacob, John, Mark, Matthew, Leonard, Lawrence and David. They were handsome men and seemed nice enough. Belle could see a family resemblance. As she visited with them, she learned that Harlow’s father was a bigamist.

  “None of us know if we’re brothers or only half brothers. Harlow had a hard time dealing with it, but it didn’t bother the rest of us much,” Jacob explained to Belle. One of their father’s wives raised all the boys born into the family, while the other wife raised the girls. It was a matter of convenience.

  “That didn’t bother you?” Belle asked.

  “Not really. We didn’t know any different. I never thought of questioning it like Harlow did. What difference did it make anyway? We were all family,” Jacob said.

  Belle could understand how Harlow must have felt and couldn’t imagine giving a baby she’d carried nine months, and birthed, her own flesh and blood, to another woman to raise. It was barbaric.

  “Harlow was the black sheep of the Pruett family. The only one to leave Provo. First he left the church and then the family and then Utah,” Jacob explained.

  "And now he’s left the world,” Belle mumbled to herself

  Maybe the reason Harlow left his family and Utah was alcohol. Mormons would take a dim view of Harlow’s drinking, Belle thought.

  Before the funeral was over, it was apparent that Harlow’s brothers were upset with Belle.

  It was John who confronted her. ‘‘A loving wife would weep over her husband’s coffin. You haven’t shed a tear.”

  Belle looked him straight in the eye with a face void of emotion.

  “What kind of a woman are you? With all of his faults, Harlow deserves a show of sorrow from his widow and mother of his children.”

  “Think what you will. I’m not going to cry. I haven’t a tear left,” Belle said.

  When the funeral was over, Harlow’s brothers, and half-brothers followed Belle back to the ranch house. She took T.J. and Hannah into the kitchen with her and set out the food for the mourners. There were cakes and pies and a ham that had come from the neighbors.

  “There’s food in the kitchen if you care to have a bite,” she announced as she walked into the parlor. The men were passing around the bottle of whiskey that had been sitting on the night stand in Har
low’s bedroom.

  “I thought you Mormons didn’t drink,” Belle said.

  “We don’t. Well, not in Utah, anyway.” Jacob said.

  “Hypocrites.” Belle scoffed as she glared at the bottle. It was as if she’d dropped a bomb. They looked at each other and put the bottle down.

  “Most of us are elders in our church. I don’t know what got into us. We must have been swept up in our despair for Harlow,” Leonard said.

  “If ye cared so much about him, why haven’t I seen ye here before when he needed ye?” Belle asked.

  “It’s not our doing. It was Harlow who broke away from us, not the other way around,” Jacob insisted.

  “Aye, of course, you’re right,” Belle said.

  “We’d like to help you in any way we can, Belle,” Jacob said.

  “You’re our kin. We care what happens to you and the children.”

  “I thank you, Jacob, but I don’t know that there’s a thing.”

  “You aren’t planning on staying on here, are you? This is no place for a woman alone.”

  “I am. This is my home,” Belle answered. “The children love it here."

  “Belle you should consider selling this place and moving down to Boise,” Jacob said.

  “Thank you for your interest, Jacob, but my mind’s made up. I’m staying here.” Belle didn’t want to discuss it further. She excused herself and turned away.

  After they finished eating, the men walked through the house looking things over and then they gathered in the parlor.

  “There were things that by all rights belonged to us,” Belle overheard Leonard whisper to the others.

  “There are tools, expensive tools, out in the smithy shed just going to waste. No woman would know what to do with them. No sense in leaving them here. We’d better load them up.”

  “I’ll go help you in a minute, Dave.”

  “This chair.” Jacob eyed Harlow’s chair. “Harlow made it out of the walnut tree Pa cut down in our backyard. He was so talented with wood. I wonder why he didn’t get into cabinet-making. Harlow would want me to have it. I was the one who helped him out when he got into scrapes."

  “Wait a minute. Harlow died owing me money,” Mark said.

  “What about his mines and the Clydesdales? They’ll be worth a pretty penny."

  “If there’s a question who should have them, it should be me. I gave him eleven dollars when he first left home,” Lawrence said.

  "All right. Why don’t we just sell all this stuff and split up the money?” Jacob suggested.

  “That seems fair.”

  “Where’s his rifle? It’s a Winchester. I was with him when he bought it. I’d like to have that; after all, I talked him into it. He was looking at something cheaper. She’ll have no use for it. Have you guys seen it, anywhere?”

  The percussion of a gunshot blasted off the walls. They all stiffened--no one moved. “Here’s the Winchester!” Belle quivered inside as her hands clamped onto the rifle, its muzzle still smoking. “I do have use for it. I’ll shoot the first man who takes anything away from this ranch.” Belle planted her feet apart as she panned the room with the gun, and prayed they couldn’t hear her heart thumping right out of her chest. She meant business. She could tell from the look on their faces, they thought she was incapable of shooting anyone. She blurted, “I shot the legs out from under an old coot in a brothel in Cheyenne, Wyoming, so just try me."

  The parlor cleared as if by magic, and the strange men from Utah in their mourning clothes hastened away in their carriages taking only their greed with them.

  After they were gone, in the mystic hour of gloaming, Belle looked at the chair they had argued over, dragged it out the door and down to the barnyard, pulled it up on a pile of brush and set it on fire. It was a handsome chair.

  “Oh, Harlow,” Belle said as she watched the flames, “you’re free now. There’s no more war to fight. I’ll watch over our little Hannah and raise her to know what a fine man her father once was. I’ll remember you that way, too. You, the kind man who brought me to the ranch when I was thrown out by the Doigs, the caring man who took me in when I had no place to go. There were good times, Harlow, times you stirred my heart. I’ll not be forgetting that.” She opened a bottle of Scotch whiskey, held it high. “Here’s to you, Harlow, for Auld Lang Syne.” She tipped it to her mouth, took a sip, and poured the rest of the bottle on the fire.

  The flames leapt high and she envisioned Harlow’s soul soaring on its longest fingers, into the smoke, above the black naked locust trees, above the snow-capped peaks, above the raging Payette where one summer day he’d made love to Belle by its rushing water, up where the wild geese fly, above all the cares and struggles in life, upward, upward--

  Samuel Thompson came to the ranch to ask Belle if she needed help with the calving.

  “I’ll need help, Sam,” Belle said, “but I’ll be asking Beufer to come and stay this time.”

  “But why, Belle? I know you like me and I know a lot more about calving than that kid.”

  “I want to thank you for all you’ve done. I couldn’t have made it without ye, but I’ve got a lot of adjusting to do here, and I have to do it alone.”

  “I don’t mean to rush you; whatever you say. It’s too soon after your loss, I guess?”

  Belle nodded.

  “When you get to the point of wanting company, I’ll be around. You do still want me to work your sales, don’t you?”

  “Of course I do. I need your guidance.”

  Sam pulled out his notebook. “I’ve been working on a five-year plan. See what you think. If all goes well, we should double your herd and in another three years triple it.” He showed Belle a sheet of penciled figures. “You know, Belle, this isn’t the best grazing land. There are only pockets. Have you thought about what you’ll do when the herd outgrows the ranch?”

  “Well, I’ve got the mines. Some of them were only mineral rights but the one on Shafer Creek, Harlow bought that ground outright. It was the only way he could get it. There’s a quarter of a quarter section, forty acres and it’s grassy.”

  “If I had the plat, I’d go look it over,” Sam offered. Belle thumbed through a box and handed him the document.

  “I’ll keep my eyes open, too. There may be something down in Spring Valley around the Burnell’s spread. That wouldn’t be too far away."

  “Should I give ye a retainer now or how should we handle this year’s fee?” Belle asked.

  “How about my working for twenty-five percent of your profit? That leaves you with your capital so we can enlarge the herd when we can make a good buy and if you don’t make money, then neither do I.”

  “What could be more fair?” Belle smiled. “Do we need a contract?”

  “If you like. But with you, Belle, a handshake will suit me fine. You need to give some thought about getting real help with the cattle. I’m willing.” He smiled at her.

  She had picked the right man for the job. He didn’t make her feel like a nothing just because she was a woman. There was no question about his honesty. He closed his briefcase, then crossed his legs and leaned back in his chair as his eyes flirted with Belle. “There’s a dance up at the Bunch Resort in Garden Valley next Saturday. Would you go with me?"

  “That’s kind of you to ask me, Sam. But I don’t think it’s wise to mix up our relationship. Business and pleasure, ye know. Not a good idea.” She realized how handsome he was and wondered if he was a good dancer. Her eyes met his and then she quickly looked away.

  As the months wore on, other men in the canyon and even farther away came to call on Belle. She was barely twenty, lovely to look at and a woman of some means. Why wouldn’t they? Her answer was always the same. “I’m flattered but, no.”

  “Are ye still in mourning, Belle? Is that what’s wrong?” Colleen asked one day.

  “No. I finished that before Harlow died.” Belle bit her lower lip in thought.