What Once We Loved

by Jane Kirkpatrick

  “Somethings wrong,” he said.

  “Baby will miss his place of belonging,” she told him. “Will wonder what he has done to be left behind.”

  David's face turned a little hot as he realized he had put his own needs before the child's. Of course Ben was still reeling from his mother's being gone. David should have considered that fact before he accepted. So he'd thanked Elizabeth for her kindness, then politely declined her offer.

  Oltipa had smiled gratefully and lowered her eyelids in that shy look of hers. It hadn't really been a problem that first night at all. The boy fell asleep sitting up in his basket-board, and David and Oltipa had found pleasure in newness of sharing their bodies in marriage. Their union had been everything David had hoped for, his inexperience a catalyst for discovery and not a cause for embarrassment. He must have told her one hundred times how much he cared for her, how grateful he was she'd consented to be his wife.

  He didn't know when Oltipa had brought Ben to bed with them later that first night, but when he awoke and rolled over to place his arms protectively around his wife, he'd felt the child's head and chubby neck nestled at Oltipa's breast though both still slept. The scene had warmed him, made him send his “arrow prayer,” as his mother had called those instant conversations sent heavenward in gratitude. He hadn't thought he could be this happy.

  But just now, the boy's knees had poked straight into David's back. He was sure he had little red marks turning to bruises beneath his shoulder blades. He yawned. His head felt fuzzy.

  It was probably not the boy at all but his own difficulty in talking with Oltipa about the sleeping arrangements that bothered him most. He hadn't come right out and said he wanted Ben to have his own little mat. Every time he cleared his throat and said something he thought would fall easily on her ears, like “I didn't know that boy could roll so much in his sleep,” she'd do some sweet thing like bend to kiss his nose or run the tips of her fingers across his lip. Or she'd offer him a taste of plumped-up huckleberries or whatever else it was she was fixing.

  David wondered if his own mother had been like that, cutting his father's words off with her acts of distraction? The thought hadn't occurred to him before—just how it was that a man and woman worked out these…details. He guessed usually they had time to grow together before they added that third person. This was different, all right.

  Only once had she sounded as though she knew he wanted to talk of something he found hard to say. But when he'd barely gotten the words out, she'd stopped him with, “It is the way my people sleep with their children. To keep them safe.”

  So it wouldn't be an easily changed arrangement. He wouldn't be able to just offer a solution like “I'll frame up another bed for the boy.” First they'd have to agree there was a need for change. And then find a way to reassure her that the boy was safe sleeping just a few feet from them. From the sound of it, negotiating that meant bringing his ancestors and hers back to life, a few more people than he cared to have discussing his bed habits. And it might mean bringing up what had happened to her when she'd been left unprotected by Ben's father and then later, by him. He feared she could never forgive him for allowing the likes of Zane Randolph to torture his family. He'd failed her, them. Oltipa had rescued herself and Ruth's girl. All David had done was pray and keep looking. Who would want to trust a man who'd let that happen?

  David got up, stepped outside to relieve himself, then returned to pull on his shirt and pants. He yanked at his boots, never feeling fully dressed until they were on. He didn't guess Ben would share their bed until he moved on to his own marriage bed, so there must have been a time when even Oltipa's people pushed the little ones out like a mother bird freeing her babies. David could only hope that day wasn't years away.

  And while he was thinking about kin, he realized he ought to reach out to his sister, Grace. Now that he was a married man, his uncle might let her live with him. He'd gotten a letter from her. She was with their aunt and uncle in Sacramento. He could have seen them when he took Suzanne Cullver south, if he had taken the time. But he had been anxious to get back to Oltipa and Ben, to get married and keep them safe.

  Grace would have to wait. He poked at the fire, hung the black pot filled with water on the andiron. Waited for it to heat while he found the tin of barley coffee.

  Today, he would meet Zane Randolph face to face. He would just have to do that on his less-than-rested best.

  Legally the man had done nothing wrong—that was the sick of it. Claim an Indian and take her, leave a baby to die, flee with your own child you haven't seen for five years—none of that would even be challenged in a court of law. David felt his face grow hot with the outrage of it. The situation begged for justice, yes. So today, he would hand out more than Ruth's packet of her divorce intention: He'd hand down justice of his own.

  8

  They were not even a day's ride out from Jacksonville when Carmine took off again.

  “You should have hobbled him,” Matthew shouted as they watched the animal quick-race south of the trail through an opening in the pines.

  “I can get him,” Ruth yelled back. She pressed the reins against Kodas neck and headed after him, ducking as they rode beneath the huge pines. A hobbled animal looked so pathetic, hopping as though it had two legs instead of four. Besides, she could catch him now, with her whip or a rope. She just had to get him into the open where she could swing out and snag that left front leg.

  A shout behind her, a crash of branches to her side, caused her to turn. Carmine had doubled back. She saw the rascal pitch and turn again, this time circling the mares then biting at their hindquarters. To the bellowing of Ewald who was tied to Lura's wagon, Carmine pushed the mares back through the stand of pines.

  Matthew would not be happy. Neither was Ruth. She turned Koda back into the trees, riding a parallel course, keeping one eye on the mares and the other on the low hanging branches. So she didn't notice until they reached the other side just what lay ahead.

  “Matthew,” she shouted. “Jessie! Boys! Come on through!” She waited until she heard them behind her, then kneed Koda, and they stepped out into open sunlight.

  A timbered ridge broke into a low wrist of land that flared out like webbed fingers of trees and shrubs separated by the meadow below. Nestled in one section of wood was a cabin. Mounds of grass hay were stacked lopsided not far from the house. No smoke rose up. A half-finished split-rail fence lined a portion of the perimeter. It was as peaceful as a painting.

  The mares had already started down the side ridge and spread like a swarm of bees over the meadow. A still-warm afternoon sun spilled over the sorrel and black and bay backs. Like a twist of moss-dyed yarn, a stream still licked at green despite the late season. Ruth could see tiny dots of black on the water. Geese or ducks. Further from the banks, and working up the side hills, grass waved brown beneath oaks and scattered pines, and a herd of deer ripped at the blades as though alone in the world. It reminded her of a Saint Louis city park.

  Ruth became aware of Matthew beside her.

  “Pretty, ain't it,” Lura said then, not asking a question. The woman puffed, pushing her way through to stand between Ruth and Matthews horses.

  “Indians have cleared it with their fire,” Matthew said.

  “It reminds me of your prayer, Sarah,” Ruth said. “About the valley of love and delight.”

  The girl wrinkled her eyes in her small, heart-shaped face. “Marians the one who told that, Auntie,” she said.

  “What prayers that?” Jessie asked. The girl wiped at her eyes, and Ruth wondered if she might be getting a cold or if it was smoke in the air that irritated.

  “‘When we come down to where we ought to be,’ that's the line I remember,” Ruth said. “This place feels like where I ought to be.”

  Water, grass, timber. Off the trail but close to it. It had a southern exposure for a garden and home, yet it was snug, tucked up beneath the trees. She scanned the horizon.

  “Looks li
ke old Rumpelstiltskin spun his gold here,” Jessie said.

  Ruth smiled. The children's story had been one of her favorites, too, of a little man spinning straw into gold and the queen who outwitted him to avoid giving up her firstborn. “It does have that look,” she said.

  “So we're home?” Jessie asked.

  The question jarred her. Home?

  “Someone else probably owns this already,” Matthew told her. “And it's nowhere near those Table Rocks I told you about.” He turned in his saddle. “I'm not sure exactly where we are. We might still be in California.”

  “Is it as good as the place you wintered in?” Mariah asked her brother as she made her way to stand beside him. She patted his horse's neck.

  “We were holed up north of Jacksonville.” He looked toward the mountain range to the east, getting his bearings. “The MacDonalds lived north, the folks that took in me and Joe. If they're still here.”

  “So we are in Oregon then,” Ruth said.

  “There was talk this summer of making part of this territory and some of northern California into a separate section to apply for statehood. Might have happened by now.”

  Why was he talking about things like that now? Ruth wondered. It was almost as if he didn't want their traveling to end.

  “Well I like it, wherever it is. Sometimes a place just talks to you. This one is saying my name,” Ruth said. The land rolled easily toward the stream, an apron of gold edged in green. Ruth could almost see the girls running down the gradual slope with their pinafores blowing in the wind. The boys would be whooping and hollering as they rode. She thought of young colts wobbling their first steps across the grass. Just then a red-tailed hawk swooped over to cheer them on, confirming it. Even Carmine fit right in, his reddish hide looking copper as he kicked and squealed. Water. Grass. Shade. Family. Privacy. Peace. It fed her, this land did. This could be the place where the pebbles of her life tossed across a continent could now settle, find their angle of repose. “The landmarks should make it easy to describe, to find out who owns it,” Ruth said.

  “We're too far away from civilization to be settling in here,” Lura said. “ ‘Cept for tonight, maybe. Got to be closer to town. I want to get me some chickens and a goat or two. Can't sell goat's milk if we're living too far from thirsty miners.”

  “Thirsty miners'll travel,” Matthew told her.

  “Yeah, but not for goat's milk.”

  “I rather like it,” Ruth said. She could see that the valley might be a bit narrower than she'd want in the long run. Trees could be cleared out and burned to make pasture. And who knew how the land claim was divided up—she might end up with the side hills rather than the valley, then she'd have to buy hay and haul it from a long distance. Maybe even haul water, though from the look of the lush pasture, if she set barrels out as cisterns, they'd have water enough. The horses could drink from the stream.

  They rode closer, and she could see that the cabin was really just a shack. It might not be practical to stay the winter there unless they could shore it up. Yet something about Lura's suggesting they should move on pushed Ruth toward staying.

  “What do you think, boys?” Ruth asked. “Jessie says we should make this our home.”

  “Build a corral at that narrow place,” Jason said, pointing, “maybe catch up Carmine without having to rope him.”

  “I like it, Auntie,” Ned added. “But I'm tired of riding too.”

  “Sore bottoms do make for hasty decisions,” Lura said.

  “Best we see what's available for land claims,” Matthew cautioned. “There might not be an adjoining one to this.” He looked at Ruth. “And this one might not have a title a man could sell even if he wanted. Don't go getting your hopes up, Ruth.”

  “The only thing I'm inclined to do right now is to get Carmine roped so he doesn't lead his harem off somewhere,” Ruth said. “And find a place to get the wagon through the trees. The children and I will stay here for the night. See what the morning brings.”

  “We could still make the Table Rock site,” Lura said. “Do a comparison.”

  “Ruth's made up her mind, Ma,” Matthew said, and he reined his horse away.

  Nehemiah Kossuth lost control, just that one time.

  His young wife permitted herself to be seen by him standing before the lamp in her night linen, for a moment, a breath-holding moment. Then she blew out the lamp.

  It was what he thought of now watching the camphre dwindle into ash. He listened to the stomp of mules and the night sounds of crickets and packers turning in their sleep. The coast range mountains gave off cold. The moon cast barely a shadow from its pale opaque.

  He turned on his bedroll, unable to move his beautiful wife from his mind. Tipton was a woman-child whom he'd never seen completely, not as a husband should see a wife. He'd thought to be patient, to stay forever close to her, giving her the time she needed. Then he'd done a thing he had told himself he would not do. She hadn't pushed him away, but she hadn't been welcoming either. It was as if she'd gone away for a while, and then returned when it was all over. Hurt pooled in her eyes.

  That was when he'd chosen this occupation of packing supplies into Jacksonville.

  He could have found a way to take her to San Francisco. This separation had been as much a way to avoid looking at the accusation in her eyes as getting needed materials into the mining camp before the snows came.

  He lingered with the packing. It would be nearly two weeks before he returned, and something in her look bothered him. He thought he saw puffiness in her perfect oval face. And a sadness. She seemed so irritable of late. He knew it was his fault. His weakness that had caused it.

  He imagined her in the firelight as he had that night some months back, an image of white like porcelain, of beauty and perfection. Pearl. Ivory. Opal.

  He'd seen a blue opal once, traded to him by a Warm Springs Indian in exchange for dried meat and fruits along the trail. Nehemiah had accepted a dark rock that the Indian said inside contained “a moon river stone.” He'd cracked it open and found an opal as near to perfect as anything he'd ever seen. A blue opal. He'd hoped to work it into a setting of silver. But he'd gotten involved in other things—a mule giving him trouble; digging out a mud slide, a slipped pack. There was always something to contend with on the trail.

  When he returned to the opal a week or so later, the blue had disappeared and a dark crack like a lightning bolt fissured through the stone. Exposure to the elements, disregard, neglect, had all destroyed it. Who would have thought that the ugly-looking facade could hide such exquisiteness? Or that stones untended could deteriorate so quickly? Tipton was like that opal.

  He worried over his marriage that he'd thought solid as rock. He had enough love for both of them, he'd always thought. Tipton just needed time, tending.

  And then he'd lost control.

  He wanted her to come to him, to assume her place as his wife as one willing, not just in name, not just because she'd married him. He'd committed to wait, wanted to do whatever it took to give this woman he'd discovered on a cold December day a lifelong place of security and love. People didn't take risks unless they felt safe, unless they felt respected and confident. This he understood. It was why he'd offered to bring her mother with them to their new home. But Adora Wilson had chosen otherwise. Had chosen her son over her daughter. They'd never even discussed his mother-in-laws unexpected decision except for an occasional mention on his part that perhaps there'd be a way to mend the break someday.

  He'd edged around that topic like a wary man encountering a cougar.

  Tipton hadn't permitted discussion. She started rubbing her arm and then just went away in her mind if he came too close to some subject she wanted dismissed. He barely mentioned his meetings with the new political party, fearful that his talk of readying himself to run first for the county office, then on to the state house might send her to that distant place far away and alone.

  He tried to involve her in his life, suggested s
he be his eyes and ears. But even that might not have been wise. Her story of the Crescent City folks talking Indian troubles wasn't something a young woman needed to be exposed to, especially when he was away from home so much.

  He tossed on his bedroll again, the roots of the redwood lumped up into his blanket. He got up and poked the fire. He didn't talk easily about the things that mattered. Never had. Especially about intimate things. It was easier to remain formal, to speak to people…as a teacher might.

  Teaching, that was familiar. He'd had to instruct young recruits in the Mexican War seven years previous. And he had inspired confidence in them despite many being close to his own age. Drawing from his vast knowledge gave others security; they liked knowing about plants they might eat, how to respond when mules balked, ways to repair firearms and analyze battle plans. He'd read the classics, too, on warfare, philosophy, and such. It was gratifying knowing that the books he read or the lessons learned from the times he'd lived in the timber could serve a useful purpose. He made a point of listening in such a way that the boys spoke of their needs too, when the occasion demanded it, for those facing battles come morning. A few of them even called him Reverend, though he was far from that. Telling others what he'd learned was a natural way to gain respect.

  Perhaps that had been his error all along with Tipton, taking on the role as “teacher” with his young wife. Maybe her youngish attitudes and actions made him treat her as a child.

  Oh, he wasn't blind to her flightiness, but he could see through it to a fragile soul that did not believe she had much worth. It was his hope to give her worth by sharing time and knowledge. He blinked at the night sky, breathing a prayer of confession for being too impatient, for the sin of taking advantage. Not that saying he was sorry meant he'd never do it again; though he'd try not to, he would. But the fessing up brought him closer to the relationship that could heal his hurtful act, fill his emptiness, maybe even help him understand why he presented what wasn't his to offer. After all, a person was created with worth. Tipton had to decide to believe that on her own.