Petticoat Ranch

by Mary Connealy

  “We’ll have a good supper waiting for you, Pa.” Mandy giggled when she called him “Pa.”

  Clay nodded. “Obliged, darlin’.”

  He turned his Appaloosa to the north, toward the rugged foothills where the high plateau country climbed into a spur of the Rockies. Plenty of places for a longhorn to hide in this terrain, but Clay had seen worse growing up in the northern Rockies. This just looked like some rolling hills to him. He rode eagerly out to explore the land that was now his home.

  Sally started talking before they were out of the yard. Shocked at first, after years of riding with taciturn soldiers and trappers and cowpokes, Clay got to liking the sound of her little voice. He found he didn’t have to say much to keep her talking. Whatever she said, it all boiled down to one thing: Her pa was a giant of a man who could do no wrong and whom she loved with every ounce of her heart. And now she loved her new pa just as much.

  Clay was humbled and proud, and when he found evidence of a large herd of cattle coming to water at several springs, he realized he’d bought himself a fine ranch. All in all, a perfect day. Just maybe the best day of his life.

  There never was a worse day landed on the shoulders of a single woman who had walked on the face of this earth!

  Sophie tried to tell herself Eve had a worse day when she got herself kicked out of the Garden. And Lot’s wife had to have been unhappy about being turned to salt. That was a long time ago, though. What was happening to Sophie was happening right now—and to her! She would put it up against the worst that had been handed out to anyone.

  And the day showed no signs of ending. She’d been insulted for breaking her back keeping her children alive, in a country that chewed hard on regular folks and swallowed weaklings whole.

  She’d been married, without really being consulted about it, to a man she didn’t even know. Or so far—like!

  She’d been dumped in a house with next to no food and been ordered to make supper.

  Well, she’d show that man what she was made of! She made supper by taking Hector out and shooting a whitetail deer. She’d had snares set in the thicket that kept her supplied with pheasant, grouse, and rabbit. But this animal was a lot more to deal with. She knew how to skin and gut a deer, but she had no desire to do it the first night in her new home.

  The deer had been the first game she found, and she’d been looking for a long while before she found it. Clay would have been her first choice of shooting targets, but he wasn’t available, so she settled for the deer. Her hunting had proved difficult because, remembering the vigilantes, she had no choice but to take the girls along with her when she went. And that brought her to the worst of it. She was missing a daughter. That ornery man had kidnapped Sally!

  What in the world had Clay been thinking, taking Sally with him without asking permission or at least telling Sophie.

  And all the girls were calling him “Pa” now. She wanted to scold them and tell them Clay McClellen wasn’t their pa and he never would be. She wanted to say they were showing disrespect to the memory of their real pa by tossing him aside so quickly. But she held back the angry words. It was Clay she wanted to punish, not her girls.

  After shooting the deer, she hung it from a handy tree to bleed it and gutted it where it hung. She then slung it over Hector’s shoulders, got the girls settled on Hector, and walked back to the ranch house, leading the whole bunch of them.

  Then she had to find firewood. She didn’t have so much as an ax, so she had to find sticks that were small enough to fit in the fireplace or were thin enough to break. That wasn’t too hard; there was a nice stand of trees near the house. But it took time to get it done.

  It was full dark by the time she had venison steaks roasting on a spit in the fireplace. She also was up to her elbows in a bloody deer carcass, cutting it up for jerking.

  “Pa’s home,” Beth shrieked with pleasure.

  All the girls dashed off to greet him. Sophie saw Clay set a very bedraggled but cheerful Sally on the ground and then ride to the stable, with the girls dancing in his wake.

  Sophie ground her teeth together and turned back to her butchering with a vengeance.

  Clay came around back with Sally on one hip and Laura on the other. Beth and Mandy were close behind. He studied her and her blood-soaked apron for a long minute. Then he said, “When’s supper gonna be ready?”

  Sophie didn’t throw the knife at him by sheer willpower. She said through clenched teeth, “Mandy, check the steaks broiling in the fireplace. Beth, get out those biscuits we brought along.”

  “Good. I’m hungry.” Then Clay added with a smile, “You’re sure a pretty sight.”

  Sophie looked up, and her grip tightened menacingly on the knife. Clay didn’t seem to notice. “You’re sure making a mess of that buck. Leave it and I’ll finish it later.”

  Sophie spoke through gritted teeth. “No thanks!”

  Clay shrugged, as if he hadn’t even noticed her outrageously sarcastic tone of voice. “Okay, if you want to do it. Come on in to supper when you’re ready.”

  He turned and left her with two more hours of work to do on the deer! And the sun already fully set! She almost cried, which would have been ridiculous. She never cried. She was so tired and so hungry. She settled for her usual pastime when she was trying to live through the next backbreaking minute. Prayer. The usual prayer. “Give me strength, Lord. Help me, help me, help me.”

  Luther kicked at the fire all of a sudden and stood up in a huff. “Best be movin’,” he muttered in disgust. He’d almost let himself relax before the pestering voice started in again.

  “You’re sure in an all-fired hurry,” Buff grumbled, bolting the rest of his meal.

  “Reckon,” Luther said. It was the first time they’d stopped to eat all day.

  Buff sighed until Luther thought the hair on his beard would part. But he didn’t complain.

  Luther had never intended to sleep this early anyhow. There was starlight aplenty, and the boy needed ’em.

  They’d put a hundred miles behind them today, which was no small trick with a game horse and flat land. But in the mountains it was brutal, and their horses had taken the brunt. They needed the breather.

  “Need horses,” Buff said.

  Luther just shook his head and wondered why Buff was so consarned chatty. Luther knew what was needed as well as the next man. He clucked his horse into a trot.

  S E V E N

  Clay tried to wait up for her. She finally came in so late, though, that he’d fallen asleep in his chair. She deliberately slammed the door. He started awake then studied her wet hair for a second before he asked drowsily, “Did you wash up in the creek?”

  Sophie said tightly, “Yes.”

  “Don’t go down there again without me standing watch. I saw cougar tracks today and a few wolves. And there could be bear in this country. It’s not safe.”

  “Anything else?” she asked through clenched teeth.

  Clay shook his head. He stood up and brought out the remaining steak. He set it on the table. “The girls said you didn’t eat. That was stupid.”

  Sophie almost picked up the plate and threw it at him. She would have if she hadn’t been starving. The smell of the meat she’d started smoking had been taunting her for the last hour until she’d almost chewed on it raw. If she’d have met a cougar at the creek, he might have been in more danger of being eaten than she was.

  Instead of attacking Clay, Sophie focused on the incongruity between Clay holding supper for her and then calling her stupid. It was a good thing she was too tired to think, because it didn’t bear thinking about. She started eating the tough, succulent venison, and she could tell Clay had been careful not to let it dry out. He silently brought her coffee and set what was left of the biscuits in front of her.

  Sophie’s stomach started to fill enough that she could think about something besides eating. She realized the house had been put in order. There were no more cobwebs in the ceiling corners. The wi
ndows shined brightly against the lantern light. The girls—she glanced around sharply—the girls must have all gone to bed. How had Clay managed all this? And why? Why hadn’t he come out and taken over the butchering, surely a man’s job, and left the house to her?

  “The girls are asleep?” Sophie asked.

  “Yep. I put all three of the older girls in there.” He pointed to the bedroom on the northeast corner of the house.

  “And I put Laura in there.” He pointed to the northwest corner of the house.

  “Why didn’t you split them up two and two so the one room isn’t so crowded?”

  “Mandy and Beth said that room was always the nursery. When I tried to put Sally in there, she thought that meant I was calling her a baby, and that didn’t set well,” Clay said with a faint air of panic.

  Sophie bit back a smile, afraid he’d take offense since he was obviously upset. She knew exactly how it had gone. The tears and the whining and the begging. “No, I don’t suppose it would have.”

  “Are they supposed to cry so much and giggle every second when they’re not crying? They never quit finding something so funny that I thought it’d break my eardrums a few times. And Laura pitched a daisy of a fit when Beth tried to give her a bath. Then Beth asked me to help, but Laura was stark naked, and I didn’t think that was proper, so I said no. Then, well, maybe I said no a little. . .loud. Beth started crying.” Clay ran his hands into his hair and made it stand up on end.

  “Anyway, they’re finally asleep, so please. . .please don’t move them. If you can convince Sally to stop wailing about it, we can move them around tomorrow.”

  At least he’d been doing something. She’d pictured him sitting in here warming his feet by the fire while she butchered the deer.

  Her belly filled as her plate emptied. She rose from the table to wash up.

  “You look real tuckered. Go on to bed. The girls said you always slept in there.” Clay pointed to the bedroom on the south side of the house. She had always loved the view from the window in there. She would rise each morning and look out on a sweeping green valley descending away from her and know she had a place where she belonged in the world. A place that was truly hers. Then she’d learned the hard way that nothing was ever truly hers.

  She almost staggered when she took her first step. Clay steadied her. It occurred to her that he might not be so strong if he’d been working as hard as she had been today. Even so, she appreciated the strength of his grip. Without looking at him, she gathered herself and went to bed, thinking kindly of her new husband for the first time.

  That wasn’t strictly true. She’d thought kindly of him when she’d first found out he was Cliff ’s brother. She’d had several very kindly thoughts of him in fact. Then he’d married her without even really asking her permission. He’d left her to move into the house and hunt supper. He’d kidnapped Sally. And he’d left her to butcher and smoke the deer. Of course she’d told him she would, but if the man hadn’t registered her sarcasm, then he wasn’t making the full use of his ears.

  But before all that, she’d thought kindly of him. And now she was again, just a bit. Cliff had certainly never washed a dish in his life or helped give a baby a bath. Sophie couldn’t imagine a husband doing such things.

  As she went into the room he called after her, “Sophie?”

  She turned back. She tried to wade through her exhaustion and respond pleasantly. “Yes, Clay?” That was the first time she’d said her husband’s name. She thought it fit comfortably on her tongue.

  She’d married a very nice man.

  Very politely he said, “Don’t forget what I told you about the creek. The girls would be mighty upset if their ma got herself eaten by a cougar. You’ve lived on the frontier long enough to not be acting so stupid.”

  She’d married a troll.

  She closed the door to her bedroom with a sharp click. She slipped her nightgown on. She was so tired she barely had the covers pulled over her before she was sound asleep. She spared one second as she nodded off to wonder where the “troll” was going to sleep.

  She didn’t have long to wonder.

  “We’ll be goin’ in to services in Mosqueros this morning.” Clay announced. “Parson Roscoe said the preachin’ starts around nine so the country folks can have a long morning at their chores and still get there on time.”

  “We never go to services, Clay,” Sophie said quietly.

  Clay looked at his brand-spanking-new wife. He didn’t give much thought to what she said. Instead he gave some thought to last night. He pulled her into his arms and planted a hearty kiss on her lips.

  When he came up for air, he said, “We’ll need to be on the trail in an hour.” Then he kissed Sophie again, just ’cuz he wanted to. She sighed kind of sweetlike, and he enjoyed the sound while he helped her let go of his neck. When she was steady, he went out to see to the horses and Hector, with Sally tagging after him.

  “Why do we have to go to church, Pa?” Sally asked.

  Clay had never lived in a settled area, and although he’d stumbled on to a preacher here and there and sat through a Sunday service when he had the chance, he’d never been in any one spot long enough to have the habit of church attendance.

  “I’m a believer. I’ve lived in the northern Rockies all my life, with my pa and the mountain men who were our friends. To my way of thinking, no one can live in the grandest cathedral on earth, the Rocky Mountains, and not know there’s someone bigger than man in charge of the world.”

  “I’m not asking about believing in God.” Sally tugged on his hand as she half walked, half skipped along beside him. “Everyone does that. I just don’t know why we have to go to church.”

  “Well, you’re wrong about everyone believing in God, Sally. When I was younger, I went through a spell when I was too big for my britches. I wrangled with my pa something fierce.” Clay wondered at how comfortable he was talking to the cheerful little girl. He’d never done much talking when it was just him and pa sitting around a campfire.

  Sally’s eyes opened wide with fear. “You fought with your pa?”

  Clay wondered why that scared her. He shrugged and went on jabbering. “There were lots of little fights when I got to thinking I was too much of a man to take orders from anybody. After my first real big blow-up with pa, I struck out on my own. That’s when I learned there were folks who didn’t believe in God.”

  “Those poor people.”

  Clay almost grinned. “The truth is I felt kinda sorry for them myself. Anyway, I was fourteen when I took off that first time. I was nearly six feet tall, and I’d been working a man’s job since I was eight, so I didn’t see anything wrong with making my own way.”

  “When you were fourteen?” Sally gasped.

  “Yep.”

  “Mandy is ten; that’s only four years from now.”

  Clay almost stumbled when he thought about his little girl going off and leaving him so soon. Then he shook his head to clear it. “Girls are different. Mandy isn’t going anywhere for a long time.”

  “So what did you do after you left your pa?” Sally stood aside as Clay began slapping leather on his Appaloosa.

  “I hunted grub and worked for a meal time to time. By the time I reached Cheyenne, I’d calmed down and went home.” The truth was he’d been so homesick for Pa and the mountains, he’d signed on with a cattle drive heading into Montana and meandered home.

  “I lived in unsettled places where there wasn’t any church, and now that I have a chance to go worship with people, I’m looking forward to it.” Clay talked with Sally as he saw to the meager chores and made note of some sagging fence posts and a couple of barn doors hanging from one hinge.

  “We don’t like Mosqueros much,” Sally said.

  “Why not?” Clay barely listened to her as he looked at the neglected ranch. It would have to wait until he got a handle on the cattle and ranch land. There were several spots he wanted to dam up on the creek before the spring rains quit,
and then he had to get to the fence. He stretched his battered muscles and felt the strength of his back. He loved the life he’d gotten himself into.

  Sally said, “I reckon it’s ’cuz we’re Yankees.”

  Clay suppressed a smile. He knew of the lingering hatred some people were capable of, and it sobered him to think of some of the cruelty his wife and daughters had no doubt been subjected to while Cliff was gone fighting. But everyone in town had been very friendly to him yesterday. His new family just hadn’t been to town in a while.

  He couldn’t think of what to say to reassure her. Then he thought of those girls alternately crying and giggling at him at the same time, he already loved them. They scared him to death! So he thought he ought to head off another bout of tears. All he could think of to say was, “Don’t you worry yourself about it. I’ll take care of you.”

  Sally smiled uncertainly, and they both turned back to the chores. She was eager to do any little task for him, and although she actually slowed him down, he enjoyed being with her. When he was nearly done he said, “You better run on back to the house and get on your Sunday dress.”

  With wide, solemn eyes, Sally said, “But this is the only dress I have.”

  Clay looked at the bedraggled little dress, neatly patched but worn as thin as parchment paper. His family needed to do some shopping. “Well, go on and clean up anyway. Your ma will want to find the pretty face under all that dirt.”

  Sally giggled and gave him a big hug. Her soft, little arms were a wonder to him as he hoisted her up in the air to hug her tight. She ran off to the house, giggling some more. As he headed back in to gather his women, he slowed a bit as he thought of the house full of their giggling and the sudden way they had of bursting into tears. He wondered ruefully if he’d ever get used to them. Then he remembered their beautiful blue eyes and all that long, golden hair and Sally’s soft, generous hugs and how they all seemed to adore him. And he remembered Sophie’s warmth and hurried his step.

  He was looking forward to going to town.