Cherokee Rose

by Judy Alter

  "He's a good one, honey," Mrs. Miller said to me as we climbed the stairs to our rooms that night. "Hold on to that one."

  I blushed, but long after everyone was asleep, I lay in bed, seeing Buck Dowling's curly hair and deep, deep brown eyes.

  * * *

  Buck really began to court me after that night, waiting at the stalls for me after every show, walking home with me every night—we soon managed to walk at a different time from the others, and we walked slowly, lingering, savoring each minute together. A feeling swept over me like nothing I'd ever known, certainly nothing Bo had ever shown me in spite of some passionate moments between us. Buck made me feel cherished, protected, loved—and slightly giddy all the time.

  "See that fence?" he asked one night, pointing to a wrought-iron fence protecting someone's garden.

  "The one with the points on top?" I asked.

  "Yeah"—he grinned—"that one. You make me feel like I could leap any fence in the world." And he proceeded to take a running jump over the fence, while I screamed, "Buck, don't!" having visions of him landing on those sharp iron points.

  He landed safely on the other side with a shout of glee, and when lights came on in the house that owned the garden and fence, we joined hands and ran laughing together down the street.

  "See the things I do for you?" he asked.

  Another time he picked a bouquet, stealing from someone's carefully tended fall garden to present the flowers to me with a bow and a flourish. "They're not half as beautiful as you deserve," he said, "nor one tenth as beautiful as you."

  I blushed. I knew it wasn't true, but I thought he believed it, and that made all the difference to me.

  Sometimes he spun wonderful dreams in the air for me, visions of me roping for the Queen of England, heralded all over Europe as America's favorite cowgirl, or back in this country, starring in those newfangled moving pictures from California. Always in these grand visions, I was wealthy beyond measure, and always, Buck was beside me.

  "You've just been reading about Buffalo Bill in Europe," I accused one day when he had me riding for the queen.

  "Well," he said, "you should be riding for that show, not this one."

  "The 101 's good enough," I said defensively, "and I've got star billing at the Garden. Not bad for nineteen years old."

  "Star billing in a two-bit show that's tacked on to a horse show," he said. "You deserve better, Cherokee, and I'm going to see you get it someday."

  I sighed in contentment. It seemed to me I'd been looking after myself for a long time now, nursing my own ambitions privately, and it was wonderful to have someone take up the battle for me. I guess that's one of life's hard lessons we don't learn young—no one else ever really rides your horse or does your battle for you.

  * * *

  The first time Buck kissed me, I knew it was different from Billy's smushy kisses and Bo's more intense ones. Buck was gentle but persistent, his mouth moving on mine in a way that made the pit of my stomach lurch and sent tingles the length of my spine.

  "You've kissed a lot of girls," I said breathlessly one night, pulling away from him.

  "And you've not kissed many men," he said. "That's the way it should be."

  I took his word for it.

  We were teased, of course. Even Will couldn't resist. "Ain't seein' much of you these days, Tommy Jo," he said. "Where you disappear to every night?" But his grin told me he knew.

  The others would poke fun at us, and even the colonel harrumphed and said something privately to me about behaving and not getting in trouble. But it was Mrs. Miller who encouraged me by smiles and gentle advice. "Don't listen to them, dear. They're jealous. He's a lovely young man."

  I wrote Mama and Papa a short note that night, telling them all was well, and I also wrote Louise a long letter, telling her all about Buck Dowling, right down to the tingling along my spine.

  The show continued to be successful. Newspapers heralded it as "exciting", "daring," and "spectacular," and one reporter called us, "as good as the Buffalo Bill Wild West Show"—high praise in my books, but the comparison angered the colonel and made Buck say, "I told you so," which didn't quite make sense to me.

  Halfway through our two-week run, the colonel called us all together one morning during a practice session. "We've gotten good reviews and people have liked us here. So I've decided to take the show on the road for the year," he said. "Anyone who wants to go with me, sign up in my office. We'll winter in Oklahoma and get on the road early in the spring."

  Of course, I would have run straight to his office to be the first in line, but Buck put out a hand to stop me.

  "Let's think a minute first," he said. "There's lots of other possibilities."

  "Like what?" I demanded. The Buffalo Bill show in Europe was, so we heard, nearly bankrupt. If I couldn't ride with the Buffalo Bill—in spite of Buck's visions—the colonel's show was the next best thing.

  "Well, we could look into some smaller shows. I could ride broncs instead of playing the horn."

  I was thoroughly confused. "Why go with a smaller show when I've got top billing with this one? And why should you ride broncs when you really want to play your horn?"

  Buck hesitated. "Well, the colonel... don't you ever feel like he's running our lives?"

  I thought about that a minute. "Sure I do. But I suspect that'd be the same no matter whose show we were in. And at least with the colonel I know him, know what he's like." I was destined to be ever practical.

  Buck looked at me speculatively, no laughter in his brown eyes now. "There's one more thing. Do you want to spend the winter in Oklahoma?"

  Where else, I wondered, had I been planning to spend it? I'd thought I'd have to go back to Louise and spend the winter worrying about my future, but instead I'd be at the 101 with a show ahead of me. It sounded ideal. "You don't want to go to Oklahoma, do you?" I asked.

  "Well, after all you've told me about your pa and all, and that fellow—what's his name?"

  "Bo," I said distinctly, "and you probably won't even see either one of them if you're at the 101. I'll go to Guthrie alone."

  He could tell I was getting angry, something I'd never done with him before. "Now, Cherokee, I just want what's best for both of us—but mostly for you, and I want you to think about this. Who knows what's out there for us? We could be missing the biggest opportunity of our lives, just by going with the 101. Tell me you'll take twenty-four hours."

  I knew that twenty-four-hour period would include lots of Buck's persuasive kissing—getting more urgent and persuasive by the day—and that I'd be hard put to keep up my resolve, if he really didn't want to stay with the colonel. Reluctantly, I promised to wait twenty-four hours.

  "Cherokee! You haven't been to see me," the colonel boomed as I sat mounted on Guthrie, waiting for the afternoon performance. "Surely you're gonna join us." He chomped his cigar to one side of his mouth and gave me a lopsided grin. "Can't do my show without my star."

  "I know," I said nervously. "I just need time to think. Got to be sure I'm doin' the right thing."

  "Buck's got a place, too," he said dryly and turned away.

  After the show, as I was storing my gear in the box next to Governor's stall, Buck came toward me, arms open, and I walked into a tight hug and a passionate kiss. "Let's go for a walk," he said.

  As we walked away, I saw the colonel, hat brim down over eyes that were staring speculatively at us.

  Years later I would realize—or suspect—why Buck didn't want to stay with the colonel, but young and green and in love, I was puzzled by it. I wanted to believe in Buck's visions, but I knew there wasn't anything better out there for us right then. In spite of all I felt for Buck, my resolve to be a star in a Wild West show was stronger than ever now that I'd had a taste of fame in Madison Square Garden. I needed that applause, that excitement, even more than I needed those wild, crazy, whirling feelings I had when I was with Buck. Leaving Bo behind had been hard and leaving Buck would be harder, but the
re really wasn't a choice. And Buck would leave the show—of that I was sure.

  "Just tired of being a no-count musician," he'd said one night. "Want to make my mark somewhere."

  "You will, Buck, I know you will," I had breathed with the fervor of young love.

  Now, several nights later, I was making my pronouncement. "I'm staying with the colonel," I said, pulling away from the arms that held me tight. We were standing in the shadows of the bushes beside the boardinghouse, and everyone else was already long asleep. It was a good thing Mrs. O'Riley hadn't established a curfew as strict as her dinner rules.

  "I've got to." I went on, while Buck stood motionless, listening to me. "The colonel gives me top billing, and I can't walk away from that, for his sake or for my own." I braced myself for the persuasive argument that would follow.

  "Sure, Cherokee, I understand. And I think you're right." He placed gentle hands on my shoulders, gave me a soft kiss, and said, "We'll stay."

  My head spun until I thought I'd faint. "You'll stay?" I managed to whisper.

  He laughed aloud. "Of course I'll stay. We're together, you and me."

  And then I was the one who initiated the deep, passionate kissing. Our stand-up lovemaking was getting more and more frustrating for Buck. Even I, inexperienced in such things, could sense that. I could feel his hardness when he held me tight to him, and I could hear him sigh when we parted. One night he left me abruptly, saying, "I either go now, or we finish this upstairs in your room."

  I remembered a similar scene with Bo, and I remembered Louise's stern words about women who were teases. I would have to make some hard decisions soon, and I suddenly wished to be young again and daydreaming about boys and their smushy kisses. Buck had awakened feelings I hadn't known existed, a craving deep in the pit of my body that could, I sensed, only be satisfied by letting him make love to me. Nice girls didn't. Rose had, I was sure, and Carmelita, too, and probably Belle. But I was Tommy Jo Burns, ranch-raised and convent-schooled, and I didn't—or did I?

  About the time I was wrestling with this problem, I received a long answer to my letter to Louise. "Don't," she warned, "marry this man because you have a tingling in the pit of your stomach. Your father would whip me for saying this, but sleep with him first. Then decide if you still want to marry him, once the mystery has gone out of the physical relationship."

  That didn't quiet the doubts I was having nor make my decision any easier.

  Meantime, love went to my head in a disastrous way. Governor and I were roping steers—the first part of our act and the easiest, as we slowly worked up to the really showy tricks. The first two steers went well enough, my loop catching them safely and the pickup men hustling them out of the arena. But as the third steer was released, I stole a glance toward Buck... and my loop came up empty. The crowd laughed—a sound I was not used to nor pleased with—and I built another loop, spurring Governor after the steer who was headed hell-bent for the far end of the arena. Just as I got ready to throw my loop, the steer decided it was safer with the audience. It jumped the barricade and clattered into the stands, sending a handful of people scattering in a thousand directions, their screams only further frightening the steer. While the animal crashed about in the stands, I threw my loop again—and missed again. By now my nerves were shattered and my timing off. Blast being in love anyway, I thought.

  With visions of trampled bodies in my mind, I built another loop, trying to calm myself. And then, magically, the steer was caught by a loop that came out of nowhere behind me.

  "Got 'em, Cherokee," Will Rogers said.

  That story made the headlines, too. "Cowboy Catches Steer Run Amok in Audience," and "Will Rogers Hero of the Day at Horse Show."

  Will always said later that was how he became a star, and he used to say he owed his fame all to Cherokee Rose—and her empty loop.

  * * *

  Buck drove a bargain I hadn't expected. "Marry me before we go to Oklahoma," he said one night.

  "Marry you?" I said with surprise. Sure, the idea had been in my head, one part of the decision I was facing, and I'd had Louise's warning, but I thought marriage was a bridge I'd have to cross much later. Marriage was something for older people, for Papa and Mama, not for me. "Here? Now?"

  "Here and now," he said firmly. "Cherokee, something's got to give. We can't go on being half-lovers. I want us to be together. And I want to marry you—I don't want you to be, well, like..." His voice drifted off, but I knew what he meant, and I liked it that he felt that way. He'd made my decision for me.

  But in my mind I was rereading Louise's letter. Did I really love Buck Dowling, or was I blinded by his kisses and his hands, or worse yet, was I maybe just curious?

  "What could be better than a wedding in Madison Square Garden?" Buck asked.

  "A wedding in the Garden?" I seemed to echo everything he said like a wooden puppet. "In front of all those people?"

  He roared with laughter. "The audience? Of course not. Maybe after the last show, when it's just our people."

  And that's what we did. We got married in Madison Square Garden at nearly midnight the evening of the last performance. Cleaning crews were moving through the stands picking up trash, and bored guards stood around the edge of the arena. The minister from a nearby Presbyterian church thought we were crazy—and maybe a little disgraceful—but he agreed to perform the strange ceremony.

  When he asked, "Who gives this woman in marriage?" the colonel stepped forward and said solemnly, "I do, in place of her father." How, I wondered, would Sandy Burns feel about that?

  The minister's words—"death do us part" and "to have and to hold forever"—seemed to echo in the great cavernous gardens, and my nerves were worse than they ever had been around a horse or a rope. At one point, I thought Buck was going to have to catch me as I fainted, but the feeling passed, and I managed to make the appropriate responses to the minister's questions about taking Buck as my lawfully wedded husband. It startled me when the minister, with ever so slight a tinge in his voice, asked, "Do you, Cherokee, take this man, Buck..." But I was married as Cherokee, and Tommy Jo became a young girl, tucked forever away in the back of my mind.

  But when the minister pronounced us man and wife and Buck kissed me sweetly and tenderly, it seemed all right. In fact, it seemed wonderful.

  Mrs. Miller was there, and Belle, and even Mrs. O'Riley, along with almost everyone from the 101 troupe. After the ceremony, they all applauded and began to drift away.

  "Cherokee," Will said, "I knew you'd fall in love soon, but I didn't think you'd act so fast on it. Best of everything." He tipped his hat and wandered off.

  That was the last time I saw Will Rogers for years, though I kept reading about him in the newspapers. He'd had an offer from Hollywood, out where they were making those new movies, and he wasn't going to stay with the 101. I couldn't blame him. "It was that empty loop of yours," he'd explained to me.

  Buck and I spent our wedding night in my room at the boardinghouse, which seems unromantic but was very practical. I had a room to myself; Buck shared a dormitory-like room with five other men, and we couldn't afford a hotel.

  Mrs. O'Riley allowed us to be late for breakfast the next morning, and I was grateful that most everybody was about the business of packing when we appeared. I didn't want to be the subject of a lot of stares and speculations, and I wondered—almost desperately—if my new status as a wedded and bedded woman showed on my face.

  It must have, for Buck whispered to me, "Stop grinning," but he was grinning when he said it.

  I knew that morning that Louise's warning was useless. I'd have married Buck even faster if he'd made love to me before the ceremony. Sometime during the night as his hands and his whole long body brought me a frantic, desperate pleasure, I remembered Mama and Papa and the fights that ended so quickly in their bedroom. And for the first time I understood my parents a little bit. And I knew what Louise was trying to tell me—a man who makes love to you makes you his forever, or so it
seems at the time.

  Of course, I wanted to be Buck's forever. The world couldn't have looked any rosier to me than it did on that October morning in New York City. I was married to a man I loved, and I was about to star in a traveling Wild West show.

  I sent a telegram to Louise, signed Mrs. Buck Dowling, and wrote Mama and Papa a note. Best, I thought, give them all the news before I arrived in Oklahoma with a husband.

  * * *

  Once we were back in Oklahoma, I felt obliged to take Buck to meet Mama, Papa, and Louise. I'd told—or warned-—Buck about all of them, but still I wondered how he'd react to my strange family, and that wonder, or worry, made me nervous. We rode from the 101 to Luckett's, arriving unexpectedly about noon on a Sunday. The day was surprisingly warm for mid-October, and Mama, a worn sweater around her shoulders, sat on the porch. She looked much the same as when I'd last seen her—maybe just a shade more tired, a few more strands of gray in her dark hair.

  "Thomasina! Oh, my darling, I knew you'd come home. I tried to tell your papa to set a dinner place for you, but he said I was fooling myself." She suddenly became aware of Buck and asked suspiciously, "Who's this?"

  "Mama, this is my husband, Buck."

  The dark eyes glittered with suspicion. "You've got no husband, Thomasina. You're too young." Then her voice raised to call, "James? James, where are you?"

  Papa came barging through the door with a loud "Here I am" that stopped in midsentence when he saw us. "Tommy Jo!" His grin was genuine but tentative, as though he didn't know how it would be received.

  "Papa," I said, "this is my husband, Buck Dowling."

  Papa handled the situation with good grace. Stepping down off the porch, he offered his hand, saying, "Sandy Burns, Buck. Glad to know you." Then he reached an arm around my shoulder and asked gently, "How's the world's best cowgirl?"

  Maybe it was because I was married, making me independent of him forever, or maybe because Buck had taught me something about men and women, or maybe it was just time, but with a cry of "Oh, Papa!" I hugged him tight, and after a startled second, he hugged back. We just stood that way for a long minute, while Buck looked self-consciously away, and Mama hummed to herself.