Petticoat Ranch

by Mary Connealy

  “But what did Cliff do?” Clay couldn’t get his mind around what Sophie was telling him. He’d never heard a one of these women say a word against Cliff.

  “Well, he built that rickety lean-to on the barn,” Sophie said.

  It all clicked into place when she said that. He’d thought something looked familiar about the patching job she was doing. There were signs of it all over the ranch. Buildings and corrals that were well built and laid out intelligently. Ramshackle little add-ons that were almost universally falling down. Tidy little patch jobs that were holding the shoddy lean-tos and fence rows together. Adam did the building. Cliff did the adding. Sophie did the patching.

  Clay suddenly quit worrying about his girls wearing pants and focused all his attention on his wife. His wife who had never had much to say about his brother. Of course, he’d never asked her about him. His wife who went around doing men’s work without asking for help.

  She wasn’t doing it because she thought Clay was a lesser man than Cliff.

  She was doing it because she thought Clay was exactly like Cliff! Clay’s heart lightened until he wanted to launch into a chorus or two of “Bringing in the Sheaves” all on his own.

  “Girls, I gotta talk to your ma for a minute. You stay in the house.” He grabbed Sophie’s hand and dragged her outside, striding toward the barn until he was almost carrying her.

  “Tell me!” he ordered as he pulled her around the corner of the barn.

  Sophie’s eyebrows arched with confusion. “Tell you what?”

  “Tell me about my brother. Tell me what kind of husband he was.”

  “Oh, Clay,” Sophie said apologetically, “I don’t want to say anything against Cliff. I didn’t mean to be unkind.”

  Clay wanted to hear every unkind thing she had to say, which caused him a second of sadness. He shouldn’t want to hear ill of his brother. Even without her saying a word, she was saying a lot to admit that talking about Cliff would be unkind. Clay lifted Sophie by her waist until she was pulled hard against him and kissed the daylights out of her. He wasn’t sure just when her arms went around his neck, but sure enough, they were there. He reluctantly pulled her away. “Tell me.”

  “Clay,”—Sophie rested her hands on his chest—“your brother was a good man. He truly was. I cared about him, and I tried to help him the best I could.”

  “Help him? What does that mean?” Clay was hoping to hear that Cliff got bucked off his horse every time a naked baby went screaming past him. He didn’t expect Sophie’s voice to be so warm when she said Cliff ’s name.

  Well, he’d asked for it. He braced himself as he prepared to listen to Sophie sing the praises of his brother.

  F O U R T E E N

  Well, he’d asked for it. She braced herself as she prepared to tell Clay unflattering things about his brother.

  “Do you remember me telling you, when I was saying Cliff was an only child, that I didn’t think Cliff lied about it?”

  “I guess,” Clay said. “It sounds kind of familiar. A lot of that first day is a blur. You said something about Pa keeping the memories alive for me, and maybe Ma didn’t do that for Cliff.”

  Sophie leaned against the barn and rested her hand on Clay’s strong arm. “I believe that, Clay. I don’t think he remembered you consciously, but I think he missed you all his life. Cliff was a sad man in so many ways. It was like he was always lonely, even when he was surrounded by his family. He was moody and critical, and he wasn’t. . .well, I wouldn’t have minded so much for myself. I’m an adult woman, and I don’t need a lot of emotional nonsense.”

  Clay said quietly, “Maybe you needed a little of it.”

  Sophie smiled up at him and shrugged. “Maybe. Maybe I did. But I know the girls needed him to love them. You’ve noticed how they’re always asking you if you’ve quit loving them?”

  Clay nodded. “How could they think I’d just quit loving them?”

  “Cliff trained them to think that way. Cliff had a way of punishing you for—I wish I could say for being disobedient or bad—but the truth was, he’d do it just because the mood struck him. If there’d been any rhyme or reason to it, we could have learned what his wishes were and tried to please him, but his temper had only to do with his own feelings. We never knew when he was going to have a black mood come over him. Sometimes, he’d go days without talking to any of us.”

  “I can’t imagine the girls letting him get away with that. They climb all over me. They never stop chattering and giggling and crying. How could anyone avoid talking to them?” Clay almost sounded envious.

  Sophie had to bite back a grin. “Cliff managed it.”

  “It sounds like my brother wasn’t a very nice man,” Clay said.

  “There were bad times before the war, but he was a complicated man, just like any person is. Mostly, he was all right. He could be a charmer when he wanted to be. He sure convinced me to marry him quick enough. And I’ll always believe he really wanted me, not just my pa’s money. But after the war, it was like he left all the softer parts of himself on the battlefield. I think it was you he was missing. It was like he didn’t want anyone to be close to him. Maybe he’d learned that loving was a risk. It hurt too much.”

  “And what about the buildings and the herd?”

  Sophie reached down to her side and patted the sturdy barn. “Adam built the barn and the ranch house with his own hands, selected the site, laid out the corrals, and handpicked good stock.”

  “Didn’t Cliff do anything?”

  Sophie said sheepishly, “He bought Hector.”

  Clay’s eyebrows disappeared into his hairline. “What about Adam? Who is he? You’ve mentioned his name before.”

  “Adam came with me from my father’s farm. He was an emancipated Negro who had worked as a hired man for my pa all my life. He heard Cliff was taking me to Texas, and after twenty years on the same farm, all of a sudden Adam announced this yearning he’d always had to go west. I never asked, but I think he saw Cliff ’s weaknesses better than my folks or I did, and he knew I was going to need help.”

  “So then, why’d Adam abandon you?” “Cliff drove him off. Cliff was a difficult man to work for. He alienated most of the townsfolk, even before he went and fought for the Union. Fighting for the North was the last straw.”

  “I fought for the Union. No one’s braced me with it.”

  “Maybe it was just Cliff. He didn’t get on with people.”

  “Does that include you, Sophie?”

  “I loved your brother, Clay,” Sophie said quietly. “I loved him as much as he would let me. I won’t have the girls remembering him unkindly.”

  “That’s why you’ve never complained about him. That’s why you do so much of what I think should be man’s work. You’ve always covered for him.”

  “I guess you could put it that way. I just saw it as helping.” With a deep sigh, she continued, “A few months after Adam left, my pa and ma died, leaving me a nice bit of money from the sale of their farm. Adam had always urged us to stay out of debt, but Cliff wanted to expand. He bought a lot of land and increased the herd. He even mortgaged our ranch and the cattle, so he could buy all he wanted.” Sophie shaded her eyes and looked at the wooded hills above the house. “He bought all those bluffs to the west.”

  “But that’s mostly wasteland.” Clay looked at the rugged timberland.

  “And he bought Herefords. He was always wanting red cattle for some reason.” Sophie shook her head.

  “Herefords aren’t fit for west Texas. You need longhorns to survive in this dry country.”

  “They’re expensive, too. Then he went off to fight, and I held everything together with a couple of old hands and the girls.”

  Sophie wondered if Clay would get the hint that they were all seasoned ranchers. Now wasn’t the time to drive that point home. “Then Cliff came back, more distant and sullen than ever. He was here long enough to get his long-dreamed-of son coming along the way.”

  “Tha
t’d be Laura?” Clay said with a quick grin.

  “Cliff would have been furious. He always was when a girl-child was born.”

  Clay’s smile vanished. “Cliff was a fool.”

  “I think he was trying to replace you, Clay. Without even knowing it, he was longing for another little boy that had been lost to him. He never got his son—at least one that lived.”

  When Cliff gave her an astonished look that obviously asked what she meant, she told him of the son she had lost as an infant. As she finished, Sophie’s voice dropped to a whisper, “And he never quit punishing me and the girls for the loss of his son.”

  Clay rested one arm across her shoulders, then, when she leaned into him, he pulled her close and hugged her tight. “I’m sorry, darlin’.”

  Sophie pulled back a bit. Clay was so close and so warm, it made her head swim. She leaned forward and rested her forehead on his chest. “I don’t want you to feel sorry for me, Clay. I meant it when I said I loved Cliff. It was just that, caring about him like I did always made me sad that I couldn’t find a way to make him happy. He’s the one we should feel sorry for.”

  Clay lifted her chin. “Okay, I think I can manage to feel sorry for a man too foolish to know how lucky he was to have a house full of pretty girls all wanting nothing but to love him. And Sophie darlin’. . .”

  Sophie’s head swam a little more, and she hung on to Clay tight. “What?”

  “You can fill that house to the rafters with all the baby girls you want, now that you’re married to me. And I promise to be nothing but grateful.”

  The thought made Sophie dizzier yet, and her knees collapsed. Clay caught her and hoisted her into his arms. She saw the fear on his face and wondered what she looked like. She felt like all the color had drained from her face, and her eyelids wanted to fall closed.

  “Sophie, what’s the matter?”

  In that very instant Sophie knew. Of course she knew. She was no young girl still in pinafores, after all. She’d felt this way before. Exactly five times. She said with quiet awe, “I think we might get to filling that house sooner than you think.”

  It took him a minute. Sophie almost smiled as she waited for him to add up all the information she’d given him.

  “A baby?”

  Sophie tucked her head under his strong chin. She took one arm down from where it was wrapped around Clay’s neck and laid her hand on her belly. “The only time I’ve ever come close to fainting in my life was when I was expecting. It’s the first I’ve thought of it, but now I can think of some other symptoms.” She looked into Clay’s shining eyes. “Yes, there’s definitely a baby on the way. Our baby.”

  Clay swung her a bit in his strong arms and grinned until she thought his face would split in two. “You know they’re all ours, Sophie darlin’, but I can’t help but be tickled to be adding to our brood.”

  The smile left his face—replaced by worry. “You can’t go around riding or working outside if you might faint dead away. You’ve got to settle down now. You stay in the house and make sure and not overdo. You need to rest!”

  Clay hoisted her a little higher against his chest and started walking toward the house so fast he was practically running. “Mandy is a right handy cook, and if she’s not up to it, Whitey can make enough grub at the bunkhouse for all of us. I don’t want you leaning over the fireplace. You might get dizzy and fall face first into. . .”

  Clay’s voice faded away, and he looked horrified. He hugged her so tight she almost squeaked, but Sophie was enjoying his concern too much to beg him to let her go for so little a thing as breathing.

  “And no more riding horseback.”

  “Clay, I’m perfectly capable of. . .”

  “If you fainted on the back of a horse, you might break your neck. You might get trampled. We’ll hitch up the team for church and errands in town.” Clay stopped so suddenly he almost skidded. He whirled around to head for the barn.

  Sophie’s head started spinning again, but it was the wild ride Clay was giving her at fault, not a baby. “We don’t have to hitch up the team right this minute. We don’t have church or any errands right now.”

  Clay lurched to a halt and stared at the barn uncertainly. “We’ve got to tell the doctor you’re expecting so he’s ready when it’s time to deliver the baby.” He began striding rapidly toward the barn. He looked down at Sophie as if he were carrying some dangerous wild animal in his arms. “Maybe the doc should stay out here with us when your time is close.”

  Sophie patted Clay’s chest. “Hush now, we don’t need to go to town. I’ve never needed a doctor. Having a baby is the most natural thing in the world. I lived in a thicket and delivered Laura with no one around.”

  “No one?” Clay stopped his headlong dash for the barn. His grip loosened on her, and Sophie grabbed hold for fear he might drop her.

  “The girls were there, but they slept through it, thankfully. I didn’t want them to see a baby born. It wouldn’t be proper. Anyway, the thicket wasn’t so bad. For mercy’s sake, Clay, I had Mandy along a creek on the trail west. I was alone. Our wagon had broken an axle, and Adam had gone off to the nearest town, which was forty miles away, to get a new one. Cliff didn’t want to see a baby born, so he went off hunting until it was over.”

  That didn’t seem to reassure him at all. This time he did drop her. She was ready though. She had a firm hold of his neck, so she landed on her feet. She wondered for a minute if he was going to faint. She suppressed a grin.

  Her desire to smile faded as she remembered the rest of the story. “Then Cliff came back. When he saw it was a girl, he wouldn’t speak to me for three days. Then Adam came back. He did everything he could think of for me, but it was all over. There was nothing for him to do. He repaired the wagon, and we continued on the trail for Texas.”

  Clay’s pupils dilated. His cheeks flushed with anger. “If my brother were here, I’d beat him to within an inch of his life!”

  “At the time, I’d have held him down for you.”

  “Well, it’s not gonna be like that this time. There’ll be a doctor, and there’ll be no creek, nor a thicket!” Clay seemed to gather his wits about him. “And you’re not gonna do anything that might hurt you or the baby.”

  He seemed happiest when he was issuing orders, so Sophie let him. His eyes suddenly got serious—serious to the point of frantic. He grabbed both her arms and almost beseeched her, “You’re going to sit in that house and rock in a rocking chair and rest!”

  “Clay, we don’t own a rocking chair.”

  “I’ll build you one.” He slid his hands down her arms until he was gripping her hands tightly. “Please, tell me you’ll stop working outside. I’ve only got two more days until we move the herd up closer to the ranch. If you’ll give me two more days, three at the most, I promise I’ll get to the work you’ve been doing.”

  He was squeezing her hands hard enough that she was losing feeling in her fingers. She wanted to make him happy. She really did. That’s why she risked being honest. Anyway, it was high time she told him about the traps she’d set, before he caught himself in one. “The only thing is I’ve got a few booby traps to rig. I’ve hauled tree trunks off to the side of the trails up in the hills. They almost have enough rocks piled behind them to be ready. I need to find a few more rocks and get them in place and rig a trip wire and. . .”

  “Booby traps? What are you talking about?” Clay shook his head, and Sophie got the impression he was trying to jiggle his brains around so they’d work a little better.

  “I told you about the booby traps I was going to set. I just need a little more time. . . .”

  “And I told you to forget it!” Clay commanded. “I’ll see to the protection of this family, Sophie McClellen. You insult me every time you do it yourself. Now I don’t want you hauling any trees.” Clay’s tone grew increasingly horrified, “Especially in your condition.”

  Sophie didn’t think he’d heard her right. She’d already hauled the tr
ees. And most of the rocks. She’d let Hector do the heavy lifting of course. She was determined to try and explain again. The man really needed to know where the booby traps were for his own good.

  He swung her back up into his arms as if that was the only way he was going to let her move from now on. His strong arms around her distracted her from pressing the point. He bounced her just a bit as he headed for the house humming to himself. Sophie wasn’t sure, but she thought she recognized “Bringing in the Sheaves.”

  As he hoisted her up the steps, he said, “I can’t wait to tell the girls.”

  Sophie warned darkly, “There’s only two possible ways they’ll react.”

  Clay’s forehead furrowed with concern. “What are those?”

  “They’ll either laugh or cry. Maybe both.”

  “It’ll be laugh,” Clay said with a firm nod of his head. “They wouldn’t dare break rule number one.”

  They cried all over him.

  And with three of them on his lap at once, Clay couldn’t escape. Sophie said they were crying because they were happy. Clay thought that was just a plain waste of salt and water. He reminded them that they had promised to only cry if they were stung by a bee or the like, but they cried anyway.

  He went straight to work building a rocking chair, and Sophie was sitting in it by the end of the day. After some worry on his part, Clay decided it was okay for Sophie to hold Laura on her lap as long as she didn’t stand up holding her. Sophie kept smiling a sweet, mysterious smile that made his palms sweat, even while he couldn’t take his eyes off of her.

  That look also made him want to run for the bunkhouse and the men, people he understood. But he couldn’t leave her for fear she’d quit resting and hurt the baby or pick up one of the crying girls. So he kept watch of his contrary wife and took charge of the overflowing tears. He held his girls, and even though he ended up with a soaked shirtfront, it was the sweetest night of his life.

  “It’s all set, boss.” Percy rubbed the grizzle on his chin and groaned as he sat down at the fire. Eli handed him a cup of coffee.