Mary Connealy

by Montana Marriages Trilogy

  CHAPTER 16

  Red knew that dead coyote hadn’t been an accident. “If he ever shows up here, I want you to go into our bedroom and go into the tunnel.”

  If a man would poison an animal, he’d hurt a woman. He tossed his hat at the peg, not even bothering to check if he’d hung it up, and grabbed her by the wrist. “Let’s find a good hiding place for you.”

  Red didn’t tell Cassie somebody had poisoned his water hole. But maybe he should.

  He hated to scare her. But if Wade had bothered her when she was married to Griff, then she was scared already and rightly so.

  He’d found two dead coyotes and a dead grouse in one of the water holes he’d built. And there were no buts about that. Those animals had been poisoned and Red could read signs. Wade’s horse’s hooves were around that pond.

  He started dragging her into the tunnel, but she pulled hard enough to stop him. “Red,” Cassie interrupted his musing, “let’s think it over while we’re in town. Wade won’t come if you’re close by. At least he never did at Griff’s. And if he does, well, I’ll find a spot to hide.” Cassie looked over her shoulder at the crevice in the back of the bedroom. “I’ve explored it and I could duck into a couple of little nooks. He’d never find me. We’ll pick out a good spot together when we’re back from town.”

  Red looked from the door to Cassie to the dark slit in their wall that led into the bowels of the earth. Cassie’s plan was full of holes. Wade could find her if he took a lantern from the kitchen or if Cassie made a noise at the wrong time.

  She walked over to Red and laid her hand on his chest. “You take good care of me, Red. The tunnel will work if need be. And anyway, you never go off and leave me, not for long. It’s not like it was at Griff’s.”

  “You always call it Griff’s.”

  “What?”

  “Your old home. You call it Griff’s. You call everything Griff’s. Doesn’t it strike you as odd that you say Griff’s carriage, Griff’s horses, Griff’s house?”

  “Well, it was all Griff’s. It doesn’t seem so unusual to say that.” Cassie kept looking at the tunnel.

  Red wanted her to hear what he was saying. In frustration he took hold of her elbow and turned her to face him.

  Her forehead furrowed and she tried to answer him again. “It doesn’t mean anything. They were Griff’s, mine, both of ours. What difference does it make what word I use?”

  “I think it does make a difference. This is your home, Cass. I don’t want you to say, ‘Red’s house’ or ‘Red’s cow.’ It’s all ours. I want you to think of it that way. I wonder if you really thought of the house you shared with Griff as yours.”

  Red could see the protest forming on Cassie’s tongue. Before she could speak, he said, “In a way, since it was all your money, inherited from your ma and pa, that house and everything in it was more yours than his. But you never thought of it that way. Why do you suppose that is?”

  “I guess it was because Griff knew just what he wanted, and I didn’t care that much. He had such a clear idea of how our home should be built, how our furniture should be, how we should dress and conduct ourselves. He was a fine man to step in and take care of me like he did. And I…well, I was so grateful to him, taking me…all young and stupid and clumsy, and helping me grow into a woman who was worthy of him.”

  “Worthy of …” Red almost shouted the words, then he cut them off.

  “What is it, Red? I’m grateful to you, too. I didn’t mean I still want to be how Griff wanted. I want to be just how you want now. I’m trying to learn your ways.”

  Red grabbed her by her shoulders and pulled her up to within an inch of his face. A chill of fear flash across Cassie’s face and it made him sick to think of how she’d learned to fear a man’s anger.

  “Red, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to …”

  She quit talking. Red watched the huge internal effort she made to keep her feelings from showing on her face. She battled with herself until a deep serene expression emerged from the turmoil. Griff had trained her well. He’d taught her that she could only be loved when she’d achieved that appearance of tranquility that made her look as perfect as a china doll.

  She had hold of her composure now. “I will remember what you said and refer to this house as ours, Red. I can see why you wish it that way. I’ll try to call Griff’s…um, I mean my old house mine from now on. It was just a bad habit to say it the way I did. It won’t happen again.”

  “Cass …” Red pulled her roughly into his arms and held her very close.

  She began to apologize again. Then she slipped her hand between them and rested her fingers over her mouth.

  Red looked at her hand then back at her eyes. He could see that she was fully prepared to stand here until he’d said his piece. He glanced back at her fingers, and some of his irritation faded as he watched those fingers touch her pink lips. For just a few seconds he forgot what they were talking about. At last he tore his eyes away from her mouth. “If you disagree with me, you can say so. I want you to speak your mind.”

  “Yes, Red,” she said from behind her fingertips.

  “And you don’t always have to say, ‘Yes, Red.’ ”

  “Yes, Red…I mean, I’m glad to mind you. It’s a woman’s place, after all.”

  Red clenched his jaw tight until he saw a shiver of fear pass through her. Red relaxed his hold on her shoulders and rubbed her arms, trying to reassure her that she was safe with him. No matter what he said, she just agreed so pleasantly, it could turn a man’s head if he wasn’t careful. But he didn’t want an obedient, frightened china doll. He wanted a flesh-and-blood woman. “Ah, Cass, can’t you hear me?”

  “I hear you fine. You just said—”

  “Don’t you get my meaning, though? I don’t want you to ever be afraid to speak up. I—I wouldn’t ever hurt you, Cass. I mean…I’d never raise my hand to you.”

  “If you wanted to do that, if I’d done wrong, well, a man has a right—”

  “No man has a right to hit a woman,” Red roared.

  She stepped back a pace before she found that blasted composure and stood her ground, obviously awaiting whatever resulted from Red’s anger.

  “Stop doing that.” Red grabbed her and shook her again, but not hard, considering how furious he was.

  “Doing what, Red? Just tell me what I’m doing wrong and I’ll stop.”

  “Stop that. Stop agreeing with me all the time. If I yell at you, it’s because I lose my temper. That’s my sin, not yours. I would never strike you, and if Griff did, then he was wrong. There’s no excuse for a man treating a woman like that.”

  Cassie clung to the appearance of serenity.

  Red inhaled and took a step back from her. He rubbed his hand across the back of his neck several times and stared at the floor. Finally he looked up at her. “Okay, you want to obey me? Then here’s the rule. I order you to tell me what you’re thinking. Every time I say something, I want the truth from you, even if the truth is, ‘Red, I think you’re as dumb as a post and as smelly as a polecat.’ I want you to start telling me what you want. I want you to say at least once a day, ‘Do it yourself,’ or, ‘Quit bossing me around,’ or, ‘Eat it or throw it out to Harriet, but I’m not making you something else.’ ”

  Cassie’s eyes widened at the horrible things Red was ordering her to say. “I could never do that.”

  “Oh, so you’re disobeying me then?” Red crossed his arms and glared at her. “I thought it was a wife’s place to obey. And I like a mouthy, rude woman with her own ideas and her own emotions. I want you to have a coat as prickly as a porcupine and a hide as thick as a buffalo and a spine as solid as the Rocky Mountains. I don’t want you doing a single thing you don’t want to do. I can’t be happily married to a woman who doesn’t nag me a little. All this polite, ‘Yes, Red,’ and ‘Whatever you say, Red,’ is making me crazy. You work on it and I’ll tell you when you’re finally doing it enough.”

  She clamped her hand
harder over her mouth.

  Red grabbed her hand and pulled it away. “You can’t sass me when you’re holding your mouth closed.”

  “I…I …” A tiny giggle escaped Cassie’s lips.

  The sound eased some of Red’s frustrated anger, but he continued in the same domineering tone. “And I like laughing, too. Big, loud belly laughs. I’m an unhappily married man if you don’t laugh every time you take a notion to.”

  “You want me to call you a polecat?” Cassie giggled a little louder.

  “It’s an order.” Red said it sternly, but he didn’t try to keep the pleasure from shining out of his eyes when he heard her laugh.

  “I don’t think I can do it right now. Um…call you a…a polecat. I’ll have to work up to it.” Cassie giggled again.

  Red smiled at her then sobered. “I don’t know what things were like between you and Griff, but I’m not like him. I want a woman to stand beside me, not trail along behind. That was Griff’s way, but it was wrong. I don’t want you to be afraid of me. And maybe if you sass me a little, even if I get mad, you’ll see that you can trust me to never hurt you. I promise it before you and before God. I want you to believe me.”

  The fear returned to Cassie’s expression, but this time Red didn’t think she was afraid of him. He thought she was afraid of the whole idea that Griff was wrong to control her so completely.

  “Red, if you don’t want to step in and tell me what to do, now that Griff’s gone …” Cassie’s voice grew so weak he could barely hear her. “Then who is going to?”

  The last of Red’s anger died away, replaced with a deep compassion unlike any he’d ever known. “I reckon you’re a woman grown.” He laid his hand on her belly. “You’ve got a babe on the way who’s gonna need a ma correcting him and teaching him right from wrong. I saw you reading Norm’s mortgage note at the bank. Do you know how few of the men out here can read? You’re smart, Cass. And God gave you a conscience like anyone else. You can just take over the job and tell yourself what to do.”

  “I don’t have much practice at that,” she whispered.

  “Well, it’s time to start getting some, Cass honey. Now I have to go do chores and check the herd. We’re gonna be late to town as it is. We can talk on the way, unless you fall over asleep again.”

  Red saw a war taking place within her. He saw the fear and excitement battle for control. He didn’t think it was a battle he could fight for her.

  Finally, fear overcame the first meager surge of self-rule. She went back to the meek little Cassie he’d wanted to banish. “I’ve been getting better with Buck. Do—do you want me to ride him by myself this time, or will we still ride double?”

  Red hesitated, dissatisfied with the results of their talk. But he didn’t know what to say and he didn’t have time to say it if he did. And he was afraid if he opened his mouth again he might just blurt out something like, “I’m completely in love with you.”

  Finally he plunked his hat on his head and said, “One hour. And don’t forget what I said about Wade.” He ran like a yellow-bellied coward out the door.

  Cassie watched him go, thinking how different he was from Griff.

  She’d controlled herself because Griff had never spared her a punishment because of apologies or tears or pleading. In fact, his rebukes were more stinging if she carried on. But in the last year especially, if she could become the china doll, if she could face him calmly and let him do his scolding until he was finished speaking his mind, he’d often “spare the rod” as he put it. She’d forgotten for a bit those hard-taught lessons of Griff’s. She knew if she’d only be a good enough wife, Red would call her sweet names again. She vowed in her heart to try harder to please him, to learn faster, to take more of the burden from his shoulders.

  Cassie thought she had him figured out now. She might even try just a little to sass him once in a while, because although she could tell he’d been joking, Red was a man who liked to laugh, and if she did it just right, she thought he’d like a little more show of just the right kind of spirit from her.

  And Red respected work. She had to work harder. It was all going to be fine. She was sure of it. She’d keep listening and learning and working hard, and after a time, maybe she could work her way straight into Red’s heart.

  CHAPTER 17

  This time Libby and Leota and Muriel were ready for her.

  Cassie woke as Red lowered her to the ground. Leota came hurrying up to the front door of Bates General Store before Red had completed his brief hellos to Muriel and Libby and rushed off to work.

  Cassie said, still half asleep, “I can stock shelves if there aren’t any customers.”

  Muriel laughed. “I’ll work you like a mule later, Cassie. I’ve got a pot of coffee on the stove and I’ve pulled up four chairs.

  Sit.”

  She waved all the ladies toward her heating stove, and Cassie welcomed the warmth. The fall weather had lingered more than usual this year but the wind bit as if to warn them winter was coming. The cold didn’t keep Cassie from sleeping. In fact, she seemed to need a nap most afternoons. It was one of the things she’d wanted to ask the ladies about. It was actually one of the few questions that she had the nerve to ask outright. She hoped to slip the other, more embarrassing questions in later. She held her hands out to the stove until some of the chill left then headed for the rocking chair the other ladies had left vacant.

  Libby pulled yarn out of a cloth bag she was carrying, and Leota began stitching on quilt blocks, each only an inch square. Muriel had a basket sitting beside her chair and lifted a half-darned sock out of it. “I should have some handwork to do, too,” Cassie said awkwardly.

  Muriel smiled up at her. “You just sit there, young lady. You’re growing a baby. That’s work enough.”

  Cassie sighed as she sat, still slightly groggy and bemused from her long rest in Red’s arms. “I declare, I take an afternoon nap just like a child. It doesn’t mean I’m sick, does it? Or could something be wrong with the baby?”

  Muriel laughed. It was such a pleasant sound. Cassie hadn’t heard much laughter in her life. At least not for a long time.

  “Seth’s mother was such a sweet lady.” Muriel sighed, and her eyes were looking at far-off memories that no one else could see. “I remember once, before I knew my eldest was coming, I was at her house helping her with threshers. Ten starving men and they ate like mules as much and with as many manners. It was right after the noon meal. The men were gone back out and we’d cleaned the kitchen. I sat down at the table to visit with her and I fell asleep. I didn’t even know it.”

  “Four hours later, Seth was there, waking me up to take me home. I’d spent the entire afternoon with my head lying on my arms at the table. My mother-in-law must have tiptoed around that whole time but she let me sleep. I tried to apologize for it and she smiled so kindly at me and said, ‘A baby takes a lot out of a woman.’ And I said, ‘What baby?’ ”

  Leota and Libby laughed and Muriel joined in. Cassie’s heart eased some when she realized she wasn’t the only woman who’d had to be told she was with child. “I didn’t know there was a baby coming until July.”

  “That’s four months. You must have been feeling some movement.” Leota laid two little squares together and began a row of tiny, neat stitches.

  Cassie said, “I remember some now that I’m feeling it a lot, but back then I didn’t recognize it as anything but muscles twitching.”

  Libby’s needles clicked efficiently. “That’s just what it feels like at first.”

  “I only found out in July when I mentioned it to Griff because I was worried about my…my time not coming for several months. I might not have said anything then except he was…he wanted to …” Cassie didn’t know how she ended up going down such personal paths. Muriel had told everyone about finding out she was expecting without having to refer to marital intimacy.

  “It was time for the one in the summer?” Libby asked lightly without looking up from the dark
red yarn in her hands.

  Cassie nodded.

  All three women started laughing.

  Cassie felt she had to explain. “It’s just that, at first Griff said I was too young.”

  “Too young for what?” Leota asked blankly.

  “Hush, Leota,” Muriel said with her lips quivering suspiciously. “Too young to be…umm…together as man and wife, right, Cassie?”

  Leota looked at Muriel then quickly returned to her sewing.

  Cassie said so softly her voice almost squeaked, “That’s right. I was fifteen when we married. Griff said that was too young. So, it’s only been the last year he’s …”

  Muriel said, “Decided you were old enough?”

  “Yes,” Cassie said with a sigh of relief. “And then he wasn’t…that is, I wasn’t …” Cassie was suddenly exhausted and wanted the whole conversation to end.

  Muriel set aside her darning and got to her feet to pour coffee. “You weren’t old enough very often?”

  Cassie nodded and the ladies started laughing again. Muriel had to lean on her chair until she got control of herself.

  Cassie’s cheeks warmed. She’d embarrassed herself again but she wasn’t sure how. Just the reference to such a personal topic, she imagined. “I thought he should know before…before…lest there be anything wrong with me. And it was a good thing, because a man isn’t to …”

  Leota lowered her quilt blocks and exchanged a quick glance with Muriel and Libby that somehow left Cassie out. “He said you were unclean.” The ladies all sobered.

  Cassie remembered their reaction to that last Saturday and hurried to change the subject before they began to once again berate Griff.

  “Red taught me how to milk his cow this week, and I’m caring for the chickens and our sow and her piglets.”

  “A mama pig is a fierce critter,” Muriel said. “Take care around her.”

  “She attacked Red once.” At the ladies’ urging, she told about Harriet and Red’s accident, and the struggles she’d had trying to feed the grouchy mother pig. They seemed delighted with her stories of life with Red, so she talked more than she could ever remember talking in her life.