The Hen House

by Sharon Sala

  ***

  As a young man, Joshua Dean had studied law back in Virginia, and had been practicing law for the past twenty years in Atlanta, until the last six months. There were rumors back in the southern states that had not set well with him. His life had been based on interpreting the Constitution of the United States of America, and the laws of the land. And, because of his background, he was struggling with the current mood of his fellow Southerners.

  The suggestion from the Northern States that slavery should be outlawed, had set the emotions of the South on fire. It challenged and threatened their livelihood in a way they could not ignore. There was no way the big landowners could operate their vast plantations without slave labor, and the Southerners were of the opinion that the Northern states had no business trying to regulate or change their way of life.

  The Honorable Joshua Dean knew that, if the rumblings actually came to fruition and the southern states seceded from the Union as they were threatening to do, he would not be able to stay true to himself and still reside in the place where he’d been born.

  The problem was, Joshua Dean was a man with thinking ahead of his time—a man who did not believe in the buying and selling of other human beings. He also held to an unpopular theory that the blacks were not lesser beings, but simply a race of people with a different way of living, and that just because they’d been sold into slavery, it should not reflect upon their capacity for learning or being treated fairly.

  Because he’d been unable to make a decision as to which side to back, he’d made an unusual choice. He’d opted to remove himself from the discord before he was forced to make a stand.

  Going west into the territories had been an option he’d considered, as had taking himself to Europe—possibly England or France. But he considered the British a cold-mannered nation, and since he didn’t speak French, the decision had been made for him. West it was.

  He’d been in the territories for just over six months, and the news he got from home convinced him that he’d done the right thing. Every day the southern states came closer and closer to seceding, at which point, he just kept taking himself further West.

  He had enough judicial pull to get himself an appointment as a judge, and was actually enjoying traveling from one outpost to another, delivering justice whenever it was needed. Of course, he had to accept that, more often than not, the people who populated these places were accustomed to meting out their own brand of justice. Several times he’d traveled days at great discomfort only to discover that the locals had taken the law into their own hands and hanged an offender without due process of the law. In those instances, he’d rendered his disapproval and moved on before he became the next target of their ire.

  Such was the case when he received word that a judge was needed in Denver City. He started out with a sense of fatalism. Either he got there before a crowd mentality developed, or he didn’t. Considering there was an ongoing gold strike, he could only imagine what might be waiting for his disposition.

  ***

  Amos Trueblood, a middle-aged man with the physique of a scarecrow, stood on the back steps of his bank building, absently tracing the part in his thin and graying hair as he watched the rush of flood waters a few hundred yards below. His long black topcoat and black pants were stained around the hems with mud splatters. His shoes, normally shined, were filthy and rimmed with dried mud. No matter how many times a day he cleaned them, at the end of a day, they were still filthy.

  In the early days when he’d first opened for business, he’d worried about many things, including being robbed. But he’d never imagined, on his worst day, that he might be ruined by a flood.

  He had opened the bank less than two months after the first gold strike had been made in the area. In loaning money to first one prospector then another, he’d acquired, by default, more than a dozen claims. While he had no intention of panning for gold, he was more than happy to acquire the land. He had a feeling that, one day, this boom town was going to make it past the gold strike, to grow into an honest to God city. When it did, he would be in on the ground floor in development. However, if the flood waters didn’t stop rising, he was going to have to rethink his future plans.

  Last night when the rain had ceased, he had hopes that today would be the day the flood would crest. After that, it would be a matter of waiting until the water began to recede. Instead, it was raining again.

  He looked up at the sky, squinting against the rain drops peppering against his face. Only God knew how this all would end.

  ***

  Letty woke up with a start and glanced toward the window as she sat up. It was still raining.

  “Eulis.”

  Eulis woke abruptly.

  “Hmm? What? Is ever’thing okay?”

  Letty frowned.

  “No. It’s still raining.”

  Eulis threw back the covers and sat up, then rubbed the sleep from his eyes as he, too, looked toward the window.

  “Yep. So it appears.”

  “I think we just made a mistake building this house,” Letty muttered.

  Eulis frowned. “How so, honey?”

  “We should have built ourselves an ark, instead.”

  Eulis grinned. He got the biblical reference quickly.

  “Don’t worry, we’re safe and sound up here.”

  “I’m not worrying about us. I’m worrying about what’s going to happen to the town below. If everything floods, then that might mean the end of the gold strike, and if that happens, people will begin leaving. I’ve seen it before. We’ll wind up living in this big old house without another living soul within a hundred miles except critters and Indians.”

  Eulis lifted an eyebrow. “Well, that’s a pretty drastic statement. If I was you, I wouldn’t set myself up for Denver City turning into a ghost town just yet. The rain will stop. It has to.”

  “But the claims along Cherry Creek are ruined.”

  Eulis nodded. “Yeah. I thought about that myself.”

  “That could put us in danger,” Letty muttered.

  “How so?” Eulis asked.

  “Think about it,” Letty said. “If you’re starving to death and your gold claim just went downstream with the flood, then there will be some who’ll look to where gold is still intact. That means people like us. Mining isn’t the same as panning. I’m afraid for you.”

  Eulis leaned over and kissed the top of her head.

  “I’ll be fine,” he said. “Remember, we’ve got Robert Lee.”

  “He can’t be everywhere at once,” Letty muttered.

  “Stop fussin’,” Eulis said, and then sniffed the air. “I smell coffee brewin’. Seems like our cook might be earnin’ her keep.”

  Letty watched Eulis crawl out of their bedrolls and dress quickly, combing his hair with his fingers as he walked out of the room. He was probably going outside to relieve himself. She needed to go, too, but wasn’t in the mood to get soaked. Still, until their furniture arrived with all the accessories that came with it, like slop jars and wash stands, she didn’t have any other options.

  Muttering as she dressed, she opted for her boots, rather than the slippers she liked to wear around the house. No need to get her slippers all wet and muddy when she had to go out. She dug through their trunk until she found a clean shirt to go with yesterday’s pants, and dressed without fuss. By the time she got downstairs, her stomach was growling from the enticing scents coming from the parlor. If she wasn’t mistaken, she smelled frying fatback and hot biscuits.

  She paused outside the doorway to the parlor and peeked in. Alice Mellin was bent over the fireplace, poking at the fire with a poker.

  “Morning, Alice,” Letty said.

  Alice looked up.

  “Oh! Good Morning, Ma’am. Breakfast is—”

  Letty frowned.

  “Not ma’am… Letty… please.”

  Alice flushed. “Yes, ma—… I mean, Letty.”

  “Something sure smells good,” Letty said.<
br />
  Alice beamed in spite of herself.

  “Thank you. It’s ready when you are.”

  “I’ll be right back,” Letty said.

  Alice went back to her cooking, while Letty made a run for the back door. They’d dug a well and built an outhouse before they’d dug footing for the house, and that was where she headed. At the time, it had seemed reasonable to put it a distance away from the back door, but this morning she was doubting the wisdom. Still, no one wanted to be greeted with the scent of an outhouse while enjoying the view. There was nothing to be done but make a run for it.

  She noticed as she stepped off the porch that T-Bone was already there, nosing around the outhouse door. She hoped a skunk hadn’t taken shelter from the weather where she intended to pee.

  Water splashed up on the legs of her pants as she ran, while the falling rain dampened her long, curly hair and poured down the back of her neck. By the time she made it to the outhouse, she was soaked. T-Bone was whining and woofed softly as she reached for the door.

  “Is it a skunk?” she asked.

  The pup didn’t have much to say on the subject other than offer up another woof.

  Letty rolled her eyes.

  “I can’t believe I was waiting for an answer,” she muttered, as she yanked the door open then stifled a gasp.

  A young girl about the age of ten was huddled on the seat. Her stringy blonde hair was plastered against her head and face, and her sodden clothes clung to her frail, little body.

  “Lord have mercy!” Letty squealed. “Where did you come from?”

  The little girl started to cry.

  “Oh, well, for pity’s sake, don’t cry,” Letty muttered, then pointed at the two-holer seat. “Scoot over. We’ll talk about all of this later.”

  The little girl stood abruptly and started to run out.

  Letty grabbed her arm.

  “Wait, honey, wait. I just gotta use the facilities. I’m not gonna hurt you.”

  The little girl turned her face to the wall, giving Letty the privacy she needed.

  “Dang it,” she muttered, as she undid her belt to lower her pants. “I could’a just stood outside in the yard and peed my pants and gotten the same results,” she muttered, as she tried to peel down the wet clothes from her skin.

  The wooden seat was cold against her bare backside as she sat. The raindrops echoed inside the small outhouse like bullets against the wood. The scent of human waste, green wood, and nearly a week’s worth of rain was an overwhelming smell. She wondered how long the little girl had been in here, and figured she must have been bad off to choose the outhouse instead of coming to the house.

  Letty eyed the little girl’s thin body as well as the scratches and bruises visible on the back of her neck. She did her business, and then pulled up her pants. The child appeared to be in pretty sad shape.

  “You okay?” she asked, and laid her hand on the little girl’s shoulder.

  The child flinched, and then cowered.

  “Not another one,” Letty muttered, thinking of Alice. She patted the child gently on the back and took her by the hand. “Are you hungry?”

  She nodded without looking up.

  “So, let’s go find us some breakfast, what do you say? We won’t hurt you,” Letty added, then led the child out of the outhouse into the rain. “Let’s run,” she said, but soon found out that wasn’t feasible. One of the child’s ankles was bruised and swollen. “Oh, honey, I’m sorry. I didn’t know you were hurt. Here. Put your arms around my neck and I’ll carry you.”

  Ignoring the rain running down the back of her shirt, Letty bent down and picked her up. When the little girl’s arms curled around her neck, an odd, almost comforting feeling swept through her. Except for carrying Alice’s baby, she’d never been around kids in her life, and yet this felt so right.

  Conscious of the shivering child and the continuing downpour, she hurried as fast as she could toward the house. Halfway there, she looked up to see Eulis coming out the back door. He bolted off the porch and into the rain, coming toward them on the run.

  “For the love of God, Leticia, what’s happened here?”

  “She was in the outhouse. Her ankle is hurt.”

  “Here, give her to me,” Eulis said, and took the child out of Letty’s arms before either one could argue. “Get on inside out of the rain,” he ordered. “We’re right behind you.”

  Letty could tell the little girl was beyond caring who had her, just as long as she didn’t have to walk. Satisfied that something constructive was being done, she made a run for the porch, then inside the house. She pulled off her muddy boots at the door and then ran to the parlor where Alice was cooking breakfast.

  “Alice! Alice! Go get some dry rags and a quilt and hurry!”

  Alice looked wild-eyed, but did as she was told, running upstairs as quickly as she could manage to move. By the time she got back, Eulis was there and kneeling by the fire. At first, she didn’t see the child, and then when she did, was horrified by her condition.

  “Oh lordy! What’s happened here?” she asked, as she began helping Letty strip the child of her sodden clothes.

  Eulis turned away, removed the food from the fireplace, and added another log. The women spread the child’s clothes out to dry, then dried her off and wrapped her in the quilt.

  “What’s her name?” Alice asked.

  Letty shrugged. “She won’t talk to me.”

  Alice sat down flat on the floor, then pulled the little girl into her lap and began to rock her in a gentle, comforting way.

  “You must be freezing,” she said softly, as she pulled the girl close. “I’ll bet your Mama and Papa are near out of their mind, wondering where you’ve gone. Did you get lost?”

  “No.”

  It was the first word to come out of her mouth, and it startled them all.

  “So… what’s your name, darling,” Alice asked.

  The little girl didn’t answer, but looked at the healing wounds on Alice’s face instead.

  “Did you fall in the water, too?” she asked.

  Letty stifled a gasp. This didn’t sound good.

  “No, honey, but is that what happened to you?” Alice asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Did your Mama and Daddy fall in the water, too?” Letty asked.

  “Unh huh… and my big brother, Dave.”

  Eulis squatted down in front of Alice and the child.

  “How did you get out of the water?” he asked.

  “Dave pushed me onto a log. When the log got caught in some rocks, I climbed off.”

  “Good girl,” Letty muttered.

  “Did Dave get out of the water?” Eulis asked.

  The little girl hid her face.

  “The water swallowed them,” she said softly. “It swallowed them all.”

  “Oh dear,” Alice whispered, and rocked a little faster.

  Letty put her hand on the child. “My name is Letty. What’s yours?”

  “Katie. My name is Katie Samuels.”

  Eulis sighed.

  “Was your Papa’s name, James?”

  The answer was barely above a whisper.

  “Yes.”

  “Well. Well then,” Eulis said, and got up and walked out of the room.

  Letty followed.

  “Eulis… did you know the family?”

  “Yes. They had a claim just below the Cherry Creek crossing. You remember… they had a wagon that they slept in instead of tents like most of the others.”

  “Oh lord,” Letty said, and then shivered suddenly.

  Eulis frowned. “Go change your clothes before you get sick.”

  “Does she have any other family?” Letty asked.

  “Not that I know of,” Eulis said.

  Letty straightened her shoulders and set her jaw.

  “You need to go tell those men who are building our cots to build another one and make it quick. We can’t have that child sleeping on the floor. And if there are any mo
re blankets to be had at the general store, get some.”

  Eulis arched an eyebrow.

  “Reckon we oughta put out the word that we’re takin’ in strays?”

  Letty turned on him then, her eyes flashing angrily.

  “What would you have me do… turn her back out in the rain?”

  Eulis sighed. “Course not. I was just tryin’ to make a joke that wasn’t all that funny. Sorry.”

  “Have Alice cook up some more food. I’ll be down as soon as I change.”

  She strode out of the room with her head high and leading with her chin.

  Eulis shook his head as he watched her go. There was one thing for sure—living with Letty kept life interesting.

  MERCHANT

  Milton Feasley had measured up the last of his coffee and flour into one pound sacks, and was stacking them on the shelves. A pound of coffee could last a family a good while if they used the grounds more than once, which most of them did. But a pound of flour could be used up in one baking. Still, it was the only way he knew how to fairly distribute the stores he had left. Once these sold, he and everyone else in Denver City would be doing without until the next freight wagon got through. If this infernal rain didn’t stop, the citizens of Denver City were going to be giving him a hard time.

  He picked up a feather duster for something to do, although dust on his goods was the last of his worries. What with the rain they’d been having, it would more likely be mold and not dust gathering on his shelves.

  The bell jingled over the door, signaling the arrival of a customer. Milton laid the feather duster aside as he recognized the man coming in the door, but it was what he saw through the window that brightened his day.

  The stagecoach was pulling into town, which meant that if it could get through, then so would the freight wagons. One was due in tomorrow. It seemed he had worried all for nothing. However, the customer who’d come in was obviously nervous. When Milton saw him take off his hat and then shuffle his feet, he knew what was coming. Carl was probably going to ask for credit. These days, it seemed he took in far less money for the goods that went out.