Measure of Katie Calloway, The: A Novel

by Serena B. Miller

  Jigger, sitting in the back of the wagon atop a box of supplies, shook his head as Katie clambered out of the wagon and hurried into the woods.

  “That woman has to go every five minutes,” Jigger said. He emphasized his contempt by aiming a stream of tobacco juice at a tree.

  “We’ve been on the road three hours, Jigger. It’s time to rest the mules anyway.”

  “You don’t see me needing to go every three hours.”

  “Leave it alone, Jigger.” Robert was not interested in continuing this conversation and tried to cut it off. “Women are just different.”

  “That’s my point. A lumber camp ain’t no place for ’em.”

  The mules snatched at a few blades of the sparse grass while Sam took the opportunity to light a short, stubby pipe the loggers called a “nose warmer.” The smell of strong pipe tobacco filled the air.

  Sam was, to Robert’s best recollection, not usually so quiet. Robert was guessing that Sam, unsure of his ability to converse without cussing, had chosen the better route of keeping his mouth shut while Katie rode beside him.

  If that was the effect Katie would have on the men, so be it. He wouldn’t mind the men cleaning up their language. Besides, the less a shanty boy talked, the harder he worked.

  He couldn’t help but wonder what thoughts were going through Katie’s head as she rode into the wilds with three men who were strangers to her—the oldest of whom was making his resentment of her quite obvious.

  While Katie was in the woods, Ned climbed off the wagon and occupied himself throwing twigs against a tree. He, too, had not complained about the trip. Robert couldn’t help compare Ned’s stalwart attitude with that of his own daughter, who would have been pitching a fit by now.

  Not for the first time, he found himself wishing things had turned out differently. Had his wife lived, he wouldn’t have had to leave his children with his sister—a woman who, no matter how hard he tried, he had never particularly liked. He was afraid her attitude was rubbing off on both of his children, but he didn’t know what to do about it. They were fed, clothed, safe, and had access to school in town. It would not be wise to bring them into the woods with him.

  As Katie came out of the forest, he noticed that she looked longingly at his black mare—as though she wished she could ride it instead of sitting in the wagon.

  “Thank you, gentlemen,” she said with dignity as she returned to her seat. Sam clucked his tongue at the mules to get them to move. Robert hid a smile at the teamster’s obvious discomfort.

  “At this rate, we’ll never get to camp,” Jigger grouched.

  Katie did not respond to Jigger’s remark, but she held her head a bit higher as the wagon rattled down the rough trail.

  Watching the old man and the young woman, Robert hoped his impetuous move in hiring her hadn’t been a mistake. Every dime he owned was riding on this venture. If Katie and Jigger couldn’t establish a working relationship and start turning out good food, the crew would shoulder their axes and walk through the woods to a smoother-operating camp. It was that simple.

  With all his heart, Robert hoped his two cooks would smooth out the friction between them. Failure was something he could not afford. Failure was something none of them could afford.

  Katie hoped they would get to the camp soon. It was embarrassing having to have these three men wait on her while she hid herself behind a tree. She hoped that Robert would make good on his promise to make sure she had her own private privy. Hopefully, it would be tucked away behind another outbuilding where the men wouldn’t be able to see her trotting back and forth. Bodily functions were best kept private.

  She looked around at the hardwood forest pressing in on her. Never in her life had she imagined there could be so many trees. They had traveled for hours without a break in the dense woods. Pennsylvania, where she had grown up, was fairly settled. There were woods, but nowhere a person could ride for a day without seeing a farm or village. Georgia was much the same. But Michigan was a wilderness. There was a primeval feel that increased with every mile they traveled—an ancient darkness that felt like a brooding presence.

  Practically every woman she knew would be appalled by this trip. And yet she was grateful. Every step into the dense forest took her one more step away from Harlan’s temper. Every step made her feel less weighed down with worry. Harlan would never, ever think to look for her in this out-of-the-way place.

  “We’re here.” Robert nodded toward a clearing.

  As the camp came into view she saw a handful of primitive log structures that were larger but not much better than the slave quarters back at the plantation. Although she glimpsed a dense pine forest in the distance, the immediate camp was a barren place, with tree stumps clustered in between the buildings. There was no color, nothing of beauty, nothing but raw shelters built to facilitate the cutting of trees and nothing else.

  Robert silently rode beside her, as though waiting for her to comment. Her mother’s training for social situations rose to the occasion. One always complimented one’s host.

  “It’s—uh, very nice.”

  Robert barked out a laugh. “No—it isn’t. But it will do.”

  As they drew closer, he pointed. “That long building to the left is the bunkhouse.” He pointed to a smaller structure. “That’s the blacksmith’s shop, and that place built into the hillside is the barn. The building over there is a combination office and store. Beside it is my cabin. The largest building is the cook shanty. The cook’s quarters are built onto the back. That’s where you and Ned will be living.”

  A sound of spluttering erupted from the back of the wagon as Jigger strangled on a wad of tobacco. She heard him spit and cough until he was breathless.

  “What did you just say, boy?” the old man demanded.

  Robert’s voice was stern. “Katie and Ned will be living in the cookhouse.”

  “Over my dead body! That’s my home!”

  “It’s not your home, Jigger. You can stay in the bunkhouse with the other men.”

  “It ain’t fair!”

  “It’s more than fair.”

  Katie felt sick. She was taking the old man’s living quarters? Had she known that was part of the deal, she would never have agreed. Or—at one time in her life, she would never have agreed. At the moment, she didn’t have a choice. They were all at the mercy of Robert’s decisions. She wanted to protest but knew she had little choice. She and Ned couldn’t exactly move into the bunkhouse with the men, or sleep in the barn, or live in the woods.

  Sam pulled the wagon up to the door of the cook shanty, and she and Ned set foot on the springy, pine-needle-covered soil where they would be living and working for the next few months.

  Robert and Jigger appeared to be involved in a silent test of wills. They were staring at each other, motionless. Jigger’s jaw jutted out like he was ready to fight.

  “It won’t hurt you to bunk with the men,” Robert finally said.

  “I’m the cook, son,” Jigger complained. “How can I keep order at mealtimes if you demote me to bunking with the men? They won’t respect me, and you don’t think they’re going to pay attention to her, do you? They’ll be too busy cutting up and making moon eyes at her. Besides, I gotta get up at two in the morning just to get breakfast ready. You don’t want this old man stumbling around in a dark bunkhouse waking up all the loggers, do you? Them men need their rest.”

  Two in the morning? Katie remembered Delia’s warnings about how hard she would work. No one got up that early—not even the dairy farmers she had known.

  Jigger’s injured arm was cradled against his chest, his sparse hair combed straight back over a liver-spotted scalp. To her astonishment, tears trickled down his wrinkled cheeks. Jigger dashed them away and glared at Robert.

  A muscle in Robert’s jaw twitched. He fidgeted, obviously uncomfortable with Jigger’s despair.

  “Oh, all right. You win—you ornery old coot. She can have my cabin. I’ll bunk with the shanty boys.
”

  She started to protest, but Robert cut her off with a look.

  “You need to get supper on. We have men to feed.” With that he strode toward the small cabin he had pointed out as his own.

  “Come on, woman.” Jigger, rejuvenated by winning the argument, headed toward the cook shanty. “Time to earn your pay.”

  Robert surveyed his living quarters from last year. So he would be the one living in the louse-infested, crowded bunkhouse. If it was anyone but Jigger, he would never have given in—but he figured he owed the old man. It had been Jigger who had kept him out of trouble when he was a boy poking his nose into every inch of his father’s lumber camps. Then later, when he had crawled back home, a grown man so broken by war and the loss of his wife that he despaired of ever being able to support his own children—it was Jigger who had reminded him about this section of timber his father had invested in back when the rest of the world was still under the impression that Michigan was nothing more than a swamp.

  His small savings and this section of timber had been enough to put him back on his feet. If this season went well, there should be enough in this year’s harvest to support his sister and two children for another year.

  “Name’s Ernie.” A sturdy young woodsman stood in his open cabin door. “Heard you was hiring.”

  “I might be.” Robert took in the young man’s appearance. He was dressed in the uniform of a Michigan lumberman: gray britches cut off several inches above the ankle, heavy boots, suspenders, knit cap covering longish black hair, and a bright red flannel shirt—the better to be seen in the woods. An old flour sack, tied with thin rope and filled with his few possessions, hung over one shoulder. A double-bit axe with a straight hickory handle was held loosely in his right hand.

  “Cletus and me are a good axe team, or we can swamp if you want,” Ernie said. “This here’s my twin brother.” He stood aside, and another young man, dressed identically but with sandy-colored hair and gentle blue eyes, appeared. “We can ride the logs good too,” Ernie announced.

  “Where else have you worked?” Robert asked.

  “Dempsey’s camp over on the Tittibiwassee last year,” Ernie said. “And the year before that.”

  “Why aren’t you going back?” Robert asked. “Dempsey runs a good camp.”

  Ernie looked at him as though the answer ought to be obvious. “We heard you’d hired a redheaded girl camp cook who makes a good apple pie.”

  “Ah.” The word was getting out. Loggers, like Napoleon’s army, marched on their stomachs, and most had an uncanny ability to ferret out the best cooks. “Put your turkeys in the bunkhouse and grab a bed. Then head on over to the cook shanty and help the new cook with whatever she asks you to do.”

  Both men looked as though he had just given them a Christmas present.

  “Thanks, boss!” They hurried away.

  Robert stood in the doorway of his cabin, looking out at the receding forest. The clean air of the pine woods filled his lungs, and he breathed deeply, grateful that he had this work to turn to. It was going to be a good year—he could just feel it.

  Other men would hear about Katie. Hopefully they were already walking through the woods, down the various tote roads, with their turkeys and axes slung across their shoulders. A ten- to twenty-mile hike was nothing to true woodsmen. Soon, they would begin to arrive.

  Some, like him, would still be recuperating from the nightmares of battle. Some would be raw farm boys supplementing income wrestled from thin-soiled farms springing up in clearings that the timbermen left behind. Some would be true axe men following the lumber industry as it worked its way across the country. Some would be immigrants struggling to understand English. Some would be scoundrels. Few would be saints. If he was lucky, at least one would own a fiddle and know how to play it. A lumber camp needed a fiddler and a storyteller to keep the men’s spirits up.

  He refocused his attention on his cabin, making note of the things he would need to take to the bunkhouse with him. He had tried to keep the vermin out of his own living space, so at least he wouldn’t be putting that woman and her brother into a nest of lice and bedbugs.

  He yanked up the straw-tick mattress and gave it a shake. It smelled moldy and felt damp. He was grateful he already had commissioned plenty of fresh straw and hay to be delivered to the barn.

  The last thing he had expected to do when he awoke today was to ready his cabin for a woman—but it was now his first order of business. Her life would be hard enough the next few months—but he would help her as much as he could.

  The sight of the hen’s egg hidden in a nest beside the barn made Harlan’s mouth water. It had been a long time since he had eaten an egg.

  Then he remembered that he hadn’t seen a chicken on the place since the day Katherine had abandoned him. There was no telling how long the egg had been there. He picked it up and flung it against the trunk of an ancient magnolia tree. It burst open, filling the air with a sulfurous smell. The stench caused his eyes to water, which soon turned into self-pitying tears. Everything was rotten these days—ruined. His beautiful home had been destroyed. Fallen Oaks was a wasteland of brambles. He had become less and less welcome at the table of old friends.

  The hunger in his belly added fuel to his fury at the Yankee wife who had scurried away. Without even one slave to rely on anymore—who was going to cook for him now?

  6

  ’Twas all the fault of Old Joe, our dirty greasy cook,

  for fixing up the grub for us no pains at all he took.

  Hot biscuits were nothing but raw dough and heavy as stone;

  and often times we had to make a meal of them alone.

  “Driving Logs on the Cass”

  —1800s shanty song

  The silent, burly teamster unloaded boxes as Katie and Jigger entered the cook shanty. It smelled of pine, stale men, and hundreds of meals of beans and bacon. A long table made of rough pine split the room down the middle, with benches on either side. Looming at the far end was the kitchen, which held a giant woodstove. Wires ran the length of the cooking area, hung with cobweb-covered dishcloths. Rough shelves were filled with bowls, plates, and cooking pots. The whole place was covered with a thick layer of dust. A dead bird lay on the floor.

  Ned pressed close to her side as they surveyed the workplace that would be their home for the next several months. She instinctively put her arm around his thin shoulders.

  “Where do you want this?” The teamster appeared in the doorway with a case of canned tomatoes balanced on his shoulder.

  “On the floor, over there.” Jigger gestured toward a far corner of the cook shanty.

  Katie approached the cast-iron stove. It was the biggest she had ever seen and must have taken enormous effort to get here. Robert obviously took feeding his men very seriously if he dragged a monster like this into the woods. Nearby, a huge square table created a work surface large enough to roll out any number of piecrusts.

  In spite of her exhaustion from the trip and being fairly overwhelmed by all the changes that had taken place in her life, she felt a small thrill of excitement. The cook shanty had a bare bones utilitarian simplicity that would make cooking for a crew of men quite possible and in some ways even enjoyable.

  “Are you just gonna stand there?” Jigger asked.

  “What do you want me to do?” They had been inside for less than a minute.

  “You’re the new cook.” He spat a stream of tobacco juice directly onto the wooden floor. “And none of us et since morning. Cook us something, woman.”

  “What is there to fix?”

  Jigger sat down on a bench and shrugged his scrawny shoulders, abdicating responsibility for anything to do with food.

  Sam brought in a fifty-pound sack of flour. “Where do you want this?”

  “Over against the wall with the canned ’maters,” Jigger said.

  “Put it on the cook’s worktable,” Katie ordered. “I don’t want the flour sitting on that dirty floor.”
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  Sam looked back and forth between them. He chose to compromise and set the sack down in the middle of the long dining table—between the two locations—and returned for another load.

  “You must have a better place to store food than against the wall,” Katie said.

  Jigger spit on the floor in answer. The contempt in his action got on Katie’s last nerve. She was tired and hungry too.

  “Quit doing that!”

  “You ain’t gonna last long around here, girlie, if you can’t stand a little tobacco juice,” Jigger said with satisfaction.

  Sam carried in two buckets of lard, set them beside the sack of flour, and returned for another load.

  “I’m hungry,” Ned whispered, tugging on her sleeve.

  “You heard the boy,” Jigger sneered. “He’s hungry.”

  If there was one thing she hated, especially after living with Harlan, it was a bully. And Jigger, although probably incapable of physically hurting her, was definitely a bully. She tried to decide what to do about him as she watched Sam carry in two cases of corned beef and return with sacks of onions and potatoes.

  As though disinterested in the entire proceeding, Jigger sat on the bench, staring out of one of the fly-specked windows.

  “I saw a stream in back.” Katie grabbed a bucket from a shelf and handed it to Ned. “Bring me as much water as you can carry. I’ll fix us all something to eat soon.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Ned scurried away with the bucket.

  Katie approached the huge stove. She had cooked plenty of meals on her mother’s stove before her marriage, and many more at Fallen Oaks after their cook disappeared. The principle was the same, regardless of the size. Wood went into the stove’s firebox and heated the oven and the smooth cast-iron top. The temperature was regulated by the type and quantity of firewood. Fortunately, a pile of split hardwood lay beside the stove. A box of dry wood shavings to use for tinder sat nearby.