Front Page Love

by Paige Lee Elliston

  “Well . . . it’s great to hear, but . . .”

  “Here’s the deal,” Nancy said. “I’m assigning you to an open-ended series on the drought in Montana and the effect it’s having on the people in the Coldwater part of the state. I don’t want fluff or sugarcoating. I want—I demand—in-depth interviews and from-the-heart writing. I want the perspectives and attitudes of the people you talk to, but I want yours too. I want to hear them talk to me through your words.” She paused for a moment. “What do you think so far?”

  “I . . . I uhh . . .” Julie stuttered.

  “I hope I can anticipate more articulate phrasing in the articles, Ms. Downs,” Nancy said sternly. Then she laughed. “You’ll report only to me on the series. I’m taking you off everything else, and I’ve already written an editorial telling readers why your column will be discontinued while you’re on this assignment.”

  “I’m really stunned—and grateful, Nancy. I’ll give you my best work. I can promise you that.”

  “I know you will. I’m afraid there’ll be a couple of noses out of joint when I announce the assignment, but this series is something I believe in. I had to give it to my top performer.” She leaned back in her chair. Julie waited for her to go on.

  “I’ve never changed my basic policy of what a newspaper should do or be. I’ve studied what happens at small presses during times of peril. I’ve read thousands of dailies and weeklies from the States and from Great Britain. The press in London was magnificent during the bombings, and so was the press here during the Depression.” She waved her hand as if whisking away smoke. “My point is that our readers depend on us. It’s our job—our obligation—to tell them what’s going on, whether good or bad. The truth may frighten them, but it won’t cause a panic, as irresponsible publishing can do. I want you to pick this drought apart, Julie. Talk to anyone you care to or need to, go wherever you want, see what you feel the need to see.” Nancy waited a moment and then added, “Give us some hope, if you can. But tell us the truth.”

  “There’s always hope,” Julie said, almost without being aware she’d spoken.

  “Maybe so,” Nancy mused. She paused a moment, then said, “There’s one other thing, and this is off the record. What do you know about our chief of police?”

  “Well, Ross Craig’s a fixture in Coldwater—he’s been in office forever. He doesn’t have many friends on the city council, but the people seem to accept him.” She hesitated for a moment and then went on. “I recall there were allegations of election problems last time he was elected, but nothing ever came of it.”

  Nancy nodded. “Anything you hear about Chief Craig, bring to me, OK?”

  “Sure. But may I ask why? What’s going on?”

  “Nothing, maybe—at least right now. Remember, I’m still the new kid on the block. I need all the information I can get on the old-timers.”

  Nancy ended the meeting with another smile. “OK. I want two thousand or more words per week, beginning ten days from today. Check in with me every couple of days or so. Any questions?”

  Julie stood, her legs a tad shaky, and reached across the desk. Nancy stood too and took Julie’s hand as if they were captains of industry sealing a multibillion-dollar deal.

  “Go,” Nancy said. “I’ve got work to do.”

  “Wow,” Julie mouthed silently to herself as she walked dazedly to her cubicle. She dropped into her chair, clicked on her computer more from habit than intent, and stared at the icons that appeared on her screen but didn’t really see them.

  This is what I trained for—an important story, a series that will have a real impact on the lives of my readers. The drought is on everyone’s mind. Nancy’s right. People—all of us—are nervous. Maybe through my words and pictures I can lessen that fear a bit, or offer a little hope, or . . .

  The tiny, tinny notes of a Bach concerto coming from her cell phone buried somewhere in her large leather purse brought Julie back to the Express newsroom. She had to clear her throat twice before speaking.

  “Julie Downs.”

  “Julie—Danny Pulver.”

  “Oh, hi, Danny. What’s up?”

  “I’m at your place with Drifter. I’ve examined him, and I don’t see any shoeing or gait problem. Those marks you’re seeing above his shoes . . .”

  Julie mentally shifted gears. She’d called Danny Pulver, the local vet, to look at some abrasions at the front heels of her Quarter Horse gelding, Drifter. “I thought he might be striking himself with the toes of his rear shoes.”

  “No, it’s not a gait interference thing. Actually, it’s a fairly common problem in very dry parts of the country. There’s a long, technical name for it, but the cowboys call it ‘scratches.’ Drifter doesn’t have it too bad, but you’re going to have to apply a salve twice a day, morning and night, until it goes away.”

  Julie released a deep breath of relief. “Sure. No problem. Should I wrap his legs or anything else?”

  “No. We want the air to get to the scratches. Don’t worry about this, though. He’s fine. The salve will take care of it.”

  “Thanks, Danny. Can you leave some salve or can I get it at the pharmacy?”

  “Well, no. The thing is, I have to mix some up for you at my clinic. No one I know of makes the stuff commercially.” He laughed. “Actually, it’s a formula an old rodeo hand I knew in veterinary school gave me. I need an eye of newt, some wolfbane . . .”

  Julie laughed. “And you boil it in a huge caldron over a roaring fire and dance around it at midnight, right?”

  “Exactly,” Danny said. “Are you going to be home later tonight, say around 7:00? I can come by with the stuff and show you how to apply it too.”

  “That’d be great. I’ll have the coffee on—or maybe fresh lemonade?”

  “Either is fine with me, Julie. See you then.”

  As Julie drove her new Dodge pickup truck out of the News-Express parking lot later that afternoon, some of the euphoria she’d been experiencing because of her new assignment began drifting away. She had no doubt that she could handle the weekly pieces—and handle them well—but the responsibility that had fallen to her began to sink in. As she drove to the end of Main Street, her eyes lingered on the boarded-up shops and stores, their plywood-sheeted windows and doors reminding her of photographs she’d seen in a National Geographic series on the effects of the Oklahoma Dust Bowl and the Great Depression. Coldwater was a tidy, well-maintained town, but the brooding, empty stores gave the street an aura of shabbiness and defeat. Very few pedestrians walked the sidewalks, but Julie figured that was due more to the stultifying heat than to economic conditions. Most folks did their shopping in the evening now, when the temperature would generally drop a few blessed degrees.

  Julie reached down to adjust her radio as she approached the Bulldogger, the bar Nancy had mentioned. The parking lot was almost filled with pickups and cars, and the front door was open, releasing a thick cloud of tobacco smoke into the still air. Even over the sound of her own radio, the raucous blaring of country rock from the bar throbbed in her ears, the bass line pounding like a massive drum.

  Almost before she knew what was happening, a rusted and battered old Ford pickup blasted from the parking lot, banged heavily over the curb, and slewed directly into Julie’s path, its body leaning far to one side on ineffective shocks and springs as the driver attempted to wrestle the truck into control. Julie jammed on her brakes and hauled the steering wheel to her right instinctively, away from the truck that was sliding toward her sideways.

  The unmuffled roar of the old Ford became the only sound in Julie’s universe as her Dodge skidded to the side of the road. The impact of her front wheels slamming over the curb threw her forward sharply into the embrace of her shoulder harness.

  Julie got a quick look at the driver of the out-of-control truck as he fought to straighten it in the road. He was young, tanned, with longish hair that swept well over his collar from under the dark Stetson he wore. Amazingly, he was grinnin
g as he battled his vehicle—perhaps even laughing. The back end of the Ford skidded past the left front of Julie’s stalled truck, tires spinning hard and putting clouds of acrid smoke into the air. Then it was gone, racing away from Julie as quickly as it had come on her, until even the racket of its engine disappeared.

  Several men had come out of the Bulldogger and stood near the door for a few moments, looking across and down Main Street at Julie’s truck. Julie turned away from them, away from their laughter and the remarks she was glad she couldn’t hear. She shifted into reverse and eased her front end back over the curb and onto the road.

  After a mile she was breathing normally and her hands had stopped their almost spastic dance on the steering wheel. Her truck tracked properly, with no pull to either side. There was no increase in exhaust sound; the high clearance of the Dodge had saved her muffler and catalytic converter when she went over the curb. She dragged the back of a hand across her eyes.

  What if there had been another car coming? What if that drunken jerk had crashed into a station wagon with a mom and a bunch of kids in it? What if . . .

  By the time Julie turned into her driveway and pulled her truck next to her three-stall barn, the adrenaline rush that had swung her startled fear into hot anger had receded. She was sweaty, tired, and weary of the sun that seemed to launch itself at her as she stepped out of her truck.

  She took a deep breath and looked around her home. The old house—an eighty-year-old two bedroom—was the only bright spot on her forty acres. Freshly painted a year ago, its white was pristine and sharp, and the black shutters were stark and shiny against the purity of the expanse of white. Her barn would be a project for next year’s vacation. It needed paint and some minor repairs, but it stood straight and true and made Julie proud as she looked at it.

  The rest of her ranch seemed to be composed of shades of an arid, dusty brown. Her main pasture—almost thirty fenced acres—reflected waves of heat back toward the almost impossibly deep blue of the sky. The grass, in previous years lush and rich with nutrition, looked as if it had been purposely burned over. There’d been no measurable rain for over a year, and the temperature had hovered well above its average since winter ended. There’d been no real spring. August heat had begun in late April and hadn’t released its death grip on that part of Montana since then.

  The sparse handful of pines that stood baking near Julie’s far fence line looked as if they’d given up the battle with the drought—their limbs were tainted a dull brown and were sagging slightly, looking ready to die. Julie’s eyes went to her lawn. All cosmetic sprinkling, car washing, and swimming pool filling had been restricted for several months. The allegedly hardy grass seed Julie had painstakingly worked into the ground in the front and sides of her home had withered and died. Very few of the bulbs she’d planted around her foundation had germinated, and those that had were strangled by the sun within days.

  As she approached the barn her eyes focused on a white paper bag resting under the handle of the sliding door. She bent to pick it up, seeing the name “The Coldwater Apothecary” printed on it. She opened it. Two Snickers bars peeked back at her. The boy in the truck, the heat, the new assignment, even the drought left her mind immediately as she gazed at the melting candy bars. She experienced a sparklike sensation, and then she laughed.

  Julie shoved the large front door of the barn open a couple of feet on its roller track and stepped inside, letting her eyes acclimate to the semi-darkness in the center aisle. She placed the paper bag on a shelf to the side. The barn smelled wonderful, as it always did. The scent of the good, tightly baled hay stacked on the second floor was as sweet as the smell of a dewy morning, and the odor of well-cared-for leather and the creosote wood preservative created what was called “cowboy’s perfume,” a delight to the sense of any horse lover.

  Drifter, in the end stall, snorted noisily and stamped a front hoof to get Julie moving to him with his usual snack of a carrot or a small crab apple. When Julie took an extra moment to let the peace of her barn soothe her, Drifter snorted again, this time louder and more demandingly. “Oh, hush,” Julie laughed, but she hurried to the gelding’s stall and picked up an apple from a basket on a shelf as she walked by. “Here ya go,” she said as she extended the treat on the flat of her palm over the top board of the stall.

  Drifter lipped the apple from Julie’s hand, leaving in its place a viscous mix of saliva and bits of chewed hay. Years of habit caused her to wipe her hand on the back of her pants—before she remembered she was wearing work slacks rather than jeans. A piece of cloth dipped into Drifter’s water pail did a fine job of spreading the mess over Julie’s pocket as she scrubbed at it. She sighed and tossed the cloth aside as she looked in on her horse.

  Drifter was a pretty boy, and he knew it. He was proud to the point of arrogance, in the way only a vibrantly healthy and powerful horse can be. He was buckskin—a color of the Quarter Horse breed that was like a rich, buttery caramel—with a distinctive dorsal stripe that ran the length of his spine in a deeper, almost mahogany hue. He was a full 16 hands tall—a hand being four inches in horseman’s jargon—and weighed about 1,150 pounds. His eyes, a liquid brown deep enough to fall into, were alert, intelligent, and endlessly curious.

  Drifter was, beyond any doubt, the fastest, smartest, and generally the best horse Julie had ever owned.

  She led him out of his stall and cross-tied him in the central aisle. The marks that had concerned her were low on the backs of his legs, in the area a couple of inches from the ground. The tissue there, generally tight and hairy, looked damp and abraded, as if the flesh had been partially scuffed away. The flesh had a slightly acidic smell, and it glistened in the overhead light Julie had snapped on. She left Drifter standing in the cross ties and fetched a few cotton balls from her supply cabinet. She crouched next to the horse and very gently touched cotton to where the seeping seemed to originate. Drifter tensed and attempted to shift away from Julie. She stood, stroked his neck until he calmed, and led him back into his stall. Danny will tell me exactly what to do, she thought. I could make things worse by playing veterinarian.

  She fetched another crab apple for Drifter and palmed it to him. He chewed happily, grunting slightly with pleasure as he did so. Julie checked the level of water in his pail and then headed for her house, thinking of the faith and trust she had in Dan Pulver, DVM.

  She and Danny shared a lot of similarities. They were close in age; Danny was thirty-seven, a year older than Julie. Both loved small-town living. Neither had ever been married. They both attended Coldwater Church and were active in study groups and worship meetings. Maggie Lane, wife of minister Ian Lane, in fact, was Julie’s most cherished female friend. Danny and Ian were good friends too, although it was no secret that the vet had been in love with Maggie before she and Ian were married. That, however, had been a couple of years ago.

  Danny and Julie had gone out a few times. Once, they’d attended the Montana Barrel Racing Finals at the Coldwater Arena. It had been a fun and laughter-filled day, and Julie had been certain Danny would call her the following week. He hadn’t. Another time they’d spent an afternoon riding together, Danny on his gentle Appaloosa and Julie on Drifter. That too had been a great day. They’d talked easily and, at least in Julie’s mind, had enjoyed their time together. Again, though, Danny hadn’t called to follow up on the good day. Apparently he wasn’t interested in seeing what could possibly develop between them if they spent more time together.

  Julie sighed as she opened the door and stepped into her kitchen. Her home didn’t seem to welcome her as it always had in the years she’d owned it. Instead, the contained heat weighed her down and made the smallest household tasks into major expenditures of energy that simply didn’t seem worth the trouble. Her cereal bowl and juice glass sat in the sink, and a sheaf of mail—mostly bills, circulars, and advertising—was strewn across the kitchen table. A carton of milk stood on the shelf near the refrigerator; she had obviously forgotte
n to put it back in the fridge that morning. Julie picked it up, the soft warmth of the plastic an unpleasant sensation in her hand. She screwed off the top, dumped the contents into the sink, and ran some water. The foul odor of curdled milk was repulsive enough to cause hot bile to rise in the back of her throat. Then, halfheartedly, she washed and rinsed her breakfast dishes, realizing that if it hadn’t been for Danny coming by that evening, she wouldn’t have bothered.

  This is part of the drought, she thought. This is what the ceaseless heat can do to the psyche. And this feeling would only be magnified if my cattle were dropping weight because of burned pastures, or if I were depending on the profits of a failed few hundred acres of wheat or corn or hay to get me through the winter. Suppose I were feeding horses I’d raised and trained to sell and there were no buyers—even at steeply reduced prices—and hay and feed bills were piling up, unpaid?

  “That’s where the stories are,” she said aloud. “Those sorts of things are what I need to go after.” Her voice sounded hollow in the empty house—hollow and a bit lonely. “A shower,” she said, forcing some anticipation into her voice, even though she was the only one hearing it. “That’ll straighten out the world, the drought, the heat, and me!”

  She tossed her Drifter-soiled slacks into the corner of her bedroom and put her blouse on a hanger, hoping to get another day out of it later on in the week. In a beat-up and faded bathrobe she’d had for more years than she cared to remember, she padded barefoot down the hall to her bathroom. Her Mickey Mouse shower curtain brought a smile to her face, as it always did. Mickey stood in a starburst of brilliant white, clutching a pen in one three-fingered hand and a spiral pad in the other. The caption beneath him read “Writers is good peopple.” Julie swept Mickey and his sentiments to the side and cranked on the hot water.

  The metallic cough from the showerhead rattled the pipes from the basement to the second floor. Julie’s well was a good one—deep, with sweet water that had never failed her. For a long moment, nothing happened. Then, the pipes clattered again, louder and more violently this time, as if some lunatic were shaking them, and the shower expelled another burst of air. Julie stood at the side of the tub, her hands grasped into fists, and whispered a quick prayer. Please, Lord—not my well.