Fern

by Greenwood, Leigh

  Seeing Samantha Bruce, realizing he would inevitably return to Boston, drained the life out of her. She felt deflated and spiritless. Expectation and anticipation were gone. In their places was a certainty Madison would marry Samantha. She wanted to be with him as much as she could before he left, but it hurt more each time.

  She longed to go to the dance. Deep down inside she wanted to know if she could compete with Samantha. It was a stupid thought -- there was no comparison between them -- but Fern couldn't banish the hope that if she could just get to the party that somehow Madison would see she loved him as much as Samantha ever would.

  "I just may have a dress that will fit you," Rose said finally.

  Fern felt her body tense. She had made her statement in the certain knowledge there wasn't a suitable dress in all of Abilene. She had never really considered facing all those scowling, censorious people. She didn't know what would make her more uncomfortable, their looks or the dress itself. She couldn't remember what it felt like to wear a dress. How to walk, how to sit. She had no idea what to do with her calloused, chapped hands. Not even gloves had been able to protect them from the rough work of roping cows.

  Then there was Samantha. No woman in her right mind would wish to be compared to her. Fern would be stepping out of her element and right into the world where Samantha was at home, the world she had been born to rule.

  If they were having a rodeo, it would be different.

  But she couldn't give up the chance to be with Madison. Hen's hearing in Topeka was coming up in three days. Hen would be released and all charges dropped. He would be free. There would be no reason for Madison to stay in Abilene any longer.

  It hurt to think of his leaving. She couldn't turn down a chance to spend a few more hours with him.

  "You're much smaller than I am," Fern said. "I couldn't fit into one of your dresses if you split every seam."

  "You could fit in this one." Rose laughed, a little self-consciously Fern thought. "I got so depressed at looking like a buffalo cow, I ordered two dresses in St. Louis. I ordered another in Kansas City. The shop in St. Louis sent me the wrong ones. If they fit you, it'll save me having to send them back."

  Fern relaxed. There was no way anyone could misjudge a dress for Rose so badly it would be large enough for her. But even as she felt relief she wouldn't be going to the party, she felt regret as well.

  For once in her life she'd like to have some fun, a chance to be herself, not to have to worry about convincing everyone she was as much of a man as anyone else. And to be honest with herself, she'd like to have a man want to dance with her. She didn't know how to dance, but she'd sure love to try.

  But most of all, she'd like to have someone think she was pretty. She knew she wasn't. She had known that since she was ten and a boy had told her she was uglier than a bulldog calf. She'd knocked him down and bloodied his nose. She'd done it more to keep from crying than to hurt him. But it had hurt so much she'd never forgotten it.

  She'd never thought about being pretty until Madison started spending all his time with her, telling her she was pretty, telling her he loved her. It was all Madison's fault. Everything was his fault.

  "We've done enough talking for one night," Rose said when she heard George's footsteps on the front porch. "Tomorrow we'll have to see if we can turn our thoughts into substance. Meanwhile, you'll have to stay away from the farm," she told Fern. "Working with pigs is no way to get ready for a party."

  * * * * *

  Madison couldn't find Rose. After working up his courage to talk to her about Fern, it irritated him she shouldn't be at the house. He decided to wait but quickly grew tired of his own company. He moved from the parlor to the front porch then to the back yard where he found William Henry playing in the shade of a cottonwood tree. Ed was nowhere to be seen.

  William Henry had put together a log cabin of real logs. He had also put up a corral made of tiny posts notched to hold the rails. The corral contained about a dozen carved horses and cows. Three cowboys on horseback patrolled the perimeter, presumably to ward off rustlers.

  "That's a handsome set," Madison commented, as William Henry galloped one of the riders about the corral. "Did your father order it for you?"

  "Nope," William Henry answered, not looking up from his play. "Uncle Salty made it for me. And he's going to make me some more while I'm gone."

  The first rider completed the circle of the corral. William Henry chose a second rider and began a second circuit.

  "Does the rider have a name?" Madison asked.

  "This is Uncle Monty." He held the figure up so Madison could get a good look.

  "See, he's making a face."

  "Why? Did someone rustle one of his cows?"

  "No. That girl has been bothering him again. Uncle Monty doesn't like girls. He says they cause too much trouble."

  Madison thought he and his brother might agree on something after all. Fern had certainly turned his life upside down.

  "Who's your other rider?" Madison asked.

  "This one's Daddy," William Henry said, showing him the largest figure. "And this one is Uncle Hen. He doesn't like girls either."

  "It's a good thing your daddy likes girls."

  "Daddy doesn't like girls," William Henry declared emphatically. "He likes Mommy."

  "I like your mommy, too," Madison said, trying to hide his smile.

  "Everybody likes Mommy," William Henry declared. "She never causes trouble. She fixes things."

  There, in a nutshell, was a description of the girl Madison had hoped to marry. It was a description of Samantha. But he had fallen in love with Fern, the greatest natural disaster west of the Mississippi.

  "I guess not every girl can be like your Mommy."

  "Uncle Monty says tangling with Iris is worse than going after a mossy back steer in a thicket of cat's claw. Uncle Monty says Iris ought to be de-ported."

  Madison laughed. "Where does she come from?"

  William Henry looked around. Then coming over to Madison, he whispered in his ear. "Uncle Monty says she comes from Hell." William Henry giggled delightedly. "Mommy says I ought not say Hell, but Uncle Monty says it all the time. Mommy says lightning will strike Uncle Monty, but Daddy says lightning wouldn't waste its time."

  Madison knew he shouldn't encourage the child, but for the first time he had a feeling of fondness for his nephew. He'd never had any interest in children, but William Henry was different. Maybe because he was George's son, part of his own flesh and blood. Maybe because he saw in him the child he had been before his father's brutality destroyed his innocent faith in the world.

  Maybe he saw in him the son he might have with Fern.

  Whatever touched him, he no longer needed to talk to Rose. He knew what he wanted, and he knew how to get it. But he had added a new item to his list. He wanted a son just like William Henry. He wanted to help bring a generation of Randolphs into the world for whom being part of a family was at once the most important and the most rewarding part of their lives

  Chapter Twenty

  A knock on the door broke Madison's concentration. Muttering a curse, he pushed the papers aside. He opened the door to find the Pinkerton investigator he had hired standing in the hall.

  "Come in," he said.

  The invitation didn't sound genuine, but the man entered as readily as if it were.

  "How's Eddie's family?" Madison asked.

  "Doing fine. Better with the money you sent them. The wife's a good manager."

  "And their ranch?"

  "Your brother's men have done more work in one week than her husband has done since he bought the place. I don't think his wife would mind if you kept him."

  "She's welcome to him the minute the hearing's over. Have you gotten any response to your inquiries?"

  "A little. There's only one man who fits the description you've worked out, but so far I can't turn up anything to connect him to the killing."

  "Do you have any ideas?"

  "No. D
o you?"

  "One."

  "Tell me," the man said, and sat down.

  * * * * *

  The day of the party Rose got up from the breakfast table, announcing briskly, "It's time to try on that dress. Let's go to my room."

  Fern had thought of the moment she would put on the dress all night long, but she was unprepared for her reaction to the two dresses that lay across Rose's bed. One was a day dress with a solid blue skirt and a white top decorated with alternating thin blue stripes and tiny blue flowers. A very handsome dress, but insignificant next to the other, a party dress of brilliant sunflower yellow. Fern had never wanted to wear a dress -- or she had denied the desire for so long she had forgotten she ever felt it -- but she knew in a flash she wanted to wear this golden dress more than anything else in the world.

  "What do you think of them?"

  She thought the yellow dress was absolutely beautiful. She would have traded her favorite cutting pony just to be able to wear it for Madison, but she knew it wouldn't fit.

  "I don't know anything about dresses," Fern replied. "What do you think?" She felt embarrassed, as though she were confessing a guilty secret.

  "I think they're lovely," Rose said, "especially the yellow. It would be just perfect with my coloring. The blue would probably be more to your liking. It's a little more plain, less frilly."

  Fern looked at the blue, but her gaze turned back to the yellow dress.

  "Which one would you wear to a party?" Fern asked

  "The yellow. The blue dress is meant to be worn at home or when visiting friends."

  "Then I guess I'd better try on the yellow dress first."

  Fern knew wearing that dress wouldn't be the answer to anything. It would probably cause more problems than it would solve, but she didn't care. She wanted to go to the party, and she wanted to go in that dress.

  But it wasn't that simple. If she went to the party, she doubted she could ever go back to the life she had led before Madison got off that train. Fern resolutely closed her mind to the consequences. If she didn't, she wouldn't have the courage to go through with it.

  All her life she had lived with fear, letting it dictate everything she did. Today she would cast caution to the winds. She would wear this dress, she would look as beautiful as she could, she would go to the party, she would dance all night even though she had no idea how to dance.

  Very soon Madison would go away and there would be nothing left of her dreams. She had no choice but to accept that, but she would have this moment, this one last chance to unfurl her wings and fly toward the sun with all the other butterflies. Just once in her life she would pretend she was just like any other woman, that she had the same chance for love. Just this once she would ignore reality, defy reason, thumb her nose at the sensible.

  She would fly as high and as long as she could. It didn't matter if she singed her wings and plunged to earth. After tomorrow, nobody would see her again. Tomorrow she would move out to the ranch. Tomorrow she would put Madison Randolph out of her mind forever.

  Only he would remain in her heart until she died.

  "Strip down to your skin," Rose ordered. "I'll see if I can find a shift that will fit you."

  "What for?" Fern asked. "I can put the dress on over my own clothes."

  "You can't try on a dress like you would a pair of shoes," Rose said. "You have to prepare yourself."

  "What do you mean?"

  "You'll see."

  For the next half hour Fern allowed herself to be pushed and pulled, prodded and poked, discussed and argued over. Rose and Mrs. Abbott discussed styles and lengths of hair, lamented that she had allowed her luxurious locks to become so dry and brittle. Mrs. Abbott virtually went into mourning over Fern's skin.

  "I've seen better on a man," she wailed. "Don't you ever put cream on at night?"

  "Papa would have taken a stick to me if he'd ever caught me putting grease on my face."

  "Cream," Mrs. Abbott corrected. "Grease is for boots. And look at her shoulders, not that they aren't much better than I thought, but her arms and shoulders are white as a sheet while her neck and hands are brown as an Indian. Where will you ever find a dress to cover her from the top of her head to the tips of her toes?"

  Fern's self-confidence hadn't been very high, but Mrs. Abbott's strictures caused it to take a nose-dive.

  "It's not that bad," Rose said, "but we will have to improvise a high collar and long sleeves. Let's hope it's a cool night."

  "It's never cool in July, not even at night," Mrs. Abbott told her.

  "Well there's nothing I can do about the weather, but I can do something about this skin," Rose said. She took a jar from the table, touched her fingertips to the white contents and gently massaged it into Fern's skin.

  "It's disappeared already," Mrs. Abbott, exclaimed. "Her skin's as dry as paper."

  "I've got a big pot of cream," Rose said, dipping into the jar once more.

  Fern let them rub and massage. She knew it wouldn't make any difference. Even the paint the girls down at the Pearl Saloon wore couldn't make her beautiful. She might not look like a bulldog steer, but she didn't look like the songstress at the Elkhorn Saloon either. She wouldn't have the cowboys sighing for the love of her, not even if she could sing like an angel.

  "Now we've got to do something with her hair."

  "What?" Mrs. Abbott demanded. "It's like trying to comb a bristle brush."

  "We've got to wash it first," Rose said. "Probably half the Kansas prairie is hidden in there."

  "I wash my hair regularly," Fern protested.

  "I was just kidding," Rose said. "One day in the Texas brush and everything needs washing."

  Fern wasn't mollified by the tacit apology, but she meekly submitted to having her hair washed. Somewhere during the oil treatment she lost herself in a daydream. She was dressed in the yellow dress and surrounded by men clamoring for a chance to talk to her, all telling her she was beautiful, all wanting to dance with her, to bring her something to eat or drink, to escort her home, to take her for a ride.

  Before she could decide how to distribute her favors, Madison appeared on the scene. Sweeping everyone aside, he took her into his arms and engulfed her in his embrace. Deaf to the shocked exclamations around him, he pressed his body against hers until she thought she would burst into flame from the heat. When she nearly swooned from the terrifying experience, he swept her up into his arms and carried her away.

  "I don't think we ought to do any more than trim the ends," Rose was saying.

  "I think we ought to cut it short and curl it."

  "No!" Fern said, horrified at the thought of appearing anywhere in curls. "My hair has never been cut."

  "What do you think about wearing it in an elegant chignon on the nape of your neck?" Rose asked. "Or you could wear it on top of your head."

  "She'd be the tallest person at the party," Mrs. Abbott objected.

  Fern didn't care what they did as long as they left her hair untouched. She'd kept her hair long despite all the trouble it caused her. Her mother's hair had been long, and Fern had always wanted to be like her mother.

  "It's a shame we can't show your shoulders," Rose said, "but your skin will improve if you stay out of the sun."

  "Not by tonight," Mrs. Abbott said.

  "No, not by tonight," Rose said with a sigh. "But I think I have a bolero jacket she can wear."

  Fern had lunch in her room while her hair dried. Rose visited with George and William Henry.

  Fern decided if being turned into a beauty meant having her hair washed all the time, her skin rubbed with oil until she felt like a greased pig, and dresses, jackets, and shifts by the dozen pulled over her head, young ladies like Samantha Bruce were much to be pitied. The waiting was awful. And boring. She was used to being active, being outside, giving orders, yet all morning long she'd sat in the same chair, never leaving her room, and agreeing to everything Rose said.

  "What's that thing?" Fern asked when Rose and
Mrs. Abbott returned after lunch.

  "It's a corset," Rose said of the garment in her hands. "You put it on before you put on the dress."

  "You're not putting that thing on me," Fern said, backing away from the stiff garment. She had heard about corsets. She had seen them on the girls at Pearl's. Sometimes a corset was about all they had on.

  "It won't have to be tight," Rose said. "You're already very slim."

  "I'm not putting it on," Rose said.

  "You can't wear the dress without it."

  "No." Fern eyed the corset as though it were some malevolent beast. She thought it was a barbaric contraption, the kind of thing Madison would have said had been thought up in Kansas.

  "I'll hold her down while you slap it on her," Mrs. Abbott offered.

  "No," Rose said. "She has to wear it because she wants to. It won't work any other way."

  "Are you wearing one of these things?" Fern demanded of Rose.

  "In her condition?" Mrs. Abbott exclaimed. "I should say not."

  "I would if it would keep me from looking big enough to be two women," Rose said

  "But you will after the baby is born?"

  "Every woman wears a corset," Rose told her with a sigh of resignation. "It's part of being properly dressed."

  If you're going to this party, you can't do things by half measures. Samantha Bruce is bound to wear a corset. You've got to wear one too.

  It wasn't as bad as Fern had feared. It wasn't the tightness that bothered her. It was feeling like she couldn't bend in the middle. She doubted she could mount a horse in this rig. She knew she'd never be able to brand a cow. She wasn't even sure she could take a deep breath.

  "I think it's time to do your hair," Rose said. "It's going to take quite a while to pin it all up."

  "By the time we're done, she'll be ready to cut some of it off."

  Fern didn't think she could stand to sit still long enough for them to do her hair, but she knew she wasn't going to let anybody cut it.