But, looking at Garn now, Emmalee found it hard to believe that he was the same man who had said and done those things. His reckless spirit, which she had always criticized, was nowhere in evidence. She was aware that she missed it and simultaneously puzzled that she should. His ironic, high-spirited enjoyment of the absurd was likewise gone. Just a few months ago, in Cairo or in St. Joe, he would have loved this situation, this triangle: himself, and a woman he had wanted, and his rival for her affections, all standing in a public place with an audience looking on.
Now, however, he seemed neither to be enjoying the situation nor, particularly, regretting it. It was as if there were a blank place in his being, a portion of his energy deliberately shrouded from view.
Emmalee’s heart was hammering away, although she did not quite know why. Everyone else was extraordinarily calm.
“Congratulations on your engagement, Miss Alden,” Garn said in a resonant, sincere voice, absolutely without mockery.
Emmalee remembered the taste of his kiss.
“I hope you’ll be very happy.”
She felt his lips on her breasts, felt his kiss trailing down over her taut and quivering flesh…
“At the risk of bringing up a subject best laid to rest…”
Emmalee felt his body poised above her, her own body hungry for the surging power and length of him.
“…let me say that I regret what happened in Denver.”
“You regret it?” snapped Randy Clay. “You’re saying that you regret it? If that isn’t a batch of hogwash, I don’t know what is.”
Emmalee said nothing, uneasily aware that her body was betraying her again.
“Clay,” Garn was saying, in a tone that was businesslike without being unsympathetic, “I know you’re at a bit of a disadvantage temporarily, what with that arm. I’ll gladly pay whatever you judge to be a proper reparation.”
“I don’t want your money, Landar. I don’t want anything from you.”
Everyone in the store was watching and listening now.
“Stop it, both of you,” said Emmalee.
“You tell ’em, honey.” Hester Brine stood up at the table. “I don’t give two hoots and a holler what happened to you in Denver or wherever. This here’s my place and you better act your age in it. Now, sit down like civilized folks and have a beer.
“That’s an order,” she added.
“Took the words right out of my mouth,” said Myrtle Higgins. “We all gotta live here.”
Hester brought mugs of beer over from the barrel and business in the store recommenced. Tell went back to registering land claimants; Emmalee sat down next to Randy, vowing to chat pleasantly for a few civilized minutes; Cynthia, Priscilla, and Darlene Bent launched a hissing squabble over a bolt of cloth, an argument resolved when Festus, their pa, threatened to buy a razor strop and use it on their rumps.
“Reckon even an old sharecropper like Fes Bent has him a good idea on occasion,” Ebenezer commented, trying to lighten the mood at the table.
“Are you going to try and claim land, Ebenezer?” asked Emmalee, to keep the conversation going.
To her surprise, the old man exchanged wary glances with Hester, Myrtle, and Garn. Emmalee recalled how the four had been leaning together conspiratorially when she’d entered the store.
“Well not in a manner of speaking, not exactly…” he fumbled.
Emmalee was amazed. Ebenezer Creel was hardly the type to falter over words. Some promised land Olympia was turning out to be! Horace Torquist was already embarked on a dubious ploy, the purpose of which was unclear, and these four people—including Myrtle, who was no-nonsense honest and hard as nails—were privy to another scheme, most likely Garn’s. In spite of his newly bland manner, Emmalee decided, he must have retained a streak of his old tendency to look for sharp angles to play.
“You know,” Hester said to Randy, “I got farm utensils here you might want to buy. I can extend credit too.”
Emmalee studied the woman. She seemed to be about fifty. Her hair was tinted and her teeth were false, but she had a good, strong figure and a bold gaze. Her eyes showed a lot of experience and more than a hint of wisdom.
“Well, thanks,” Randy replied. “I brought a few tools with me. First thing I’m going to have to do is find chickens and cows to buy, and seed for corn and oats.”
“Seed I can order for you from Sacramento. Best place for livestock is Salt Lake. Burt Pennington’s already sent men down there to buy longhorns and bring ’em back north.”
Randy’s expression darkened at the challenges: money, credit, stock, equipment, seed. He hadn’t even staked his claim yet.
“How much,” asked Emmalee, “for a milking cow?”
“Goin’ rate was six bucks as of last week,” Hester informed her.
Randy gulped. Emmalee tried to seem cheerful.
“Like I said, I do give credit on purchases. And I loan money.”
“Against what security?” asked Emmalee.
“Have to be your land, I reckon. Unless you got something else.”
“Is that your loan sign outside the store?”
“Naw. That belongs to Vestor Tell. He’s fixin’ to do real banking. Big sums. I don’t have that much. But,” she added, squinting up her eyes, “some folks like to know that all the cards are on the table.”
“Are you saying…?” Randy began.
“Anything against Vestor? Son, I don’t say nothing against nobody. Just keep your eyes open, is what I advise. And remember that old Hester might be able to work out something to our mutual advantage in case the necessity arises.”
“I’ll do that,” Randy said. He finished his beer and stood up. “Emmalee?”
She took a final swallow, rose, and left with him. She did not look at Garn. The tension of seeing him again dissipated slowly, and she knew that his presence in Olympia portended future meetings and—because of Randy—future conflicts. Why did Garn have to be there, anyway? Once more, just when she’d thought he was gone for good, there he was again. During the trek through the mountains, she’d almost convinced herself that this time she’d seen the last of him. Well, she would turn her hopes and energies toward a new life.
“Six dollars a cow!” Randy mourned. “I can’t even afford one spavined heifer!”
“Don’t worry. We’ll make it somehow.”
He put his good arm around her and kissed her on the cheek; “That’s what I love about you,” he said. “We’ll make it. I hate to borrow money though.”
“We’ll think of something.” Emmalee had never regretted quite so keenly the bargain she’d been forced to strike with Torquist. “I know! If Pennington is already bringing in longhorn cattle, maybe he’ll need extra land on which to graze them. We could rent him part of our farms for pasture…”
Randy was astounded. “Why, Em! How can you say that? In the first place, we don’t even have any land yet. In the second, we’re here to farm. Torquist would never permit it.”
“But we need money and Pennington might pay.”
“It’s out of the question. A pipe dream.”
Emmalee was a little irritated. She hadn’t thought her idea was that bad, and she’d never quite understood Torquist’s detestation of the ranchers. Land was land, after all. To be used as the men and women on it saw fit.
“Might as well sit around dreaming about getting rich like Ebenezer Creel,” Randy scoffed. “I do wonder, though, what he and Landar are up to. Mark my words, they’ll get into trouble. And when they do…”
“Let’s not talk about it.”
“You’re right. Let’s not. I’m going to mount up and ride out into the countryside. Do a little scouting around so when the rush begins I’ll know exactly what to claim. I’ll find some good acres for you too. I only hope the land’s not too hilly.”
The long line of Torquist’s pioneers, waiting to register with Vestor Tell, snaked once around the general store and wavered off down toward the river, where children frolicked
and some of the women had begun to do laundry. Emmalee was surprised to see Lambert Strep in the line again, since he’d already registered as Theodore Barnstable. Strep was hatless now, he’d shaved and changed clothes. He looked like a different person.
Emmalee drew him off to the side. “Lambert, excuse my prying, but didn’t you register already?”
Strep had a sheepish, hangdog look. “Yup,” he muttered.
“Then why are you standing in line again?”
“I’m not the only one,” he replied defensively. “Jasper an’ Virgil an’ the others is doin’ it too.”
“How come?”
“Mr. Torquist said t’ keep it under my hat. Even though it’s perfectly all right an’ we deserve it.”
“Deserve what?”
“The extra plots of land that would have gone to the guys who died. Mr. Torquist says that they paid for that land with their lives, so some of us are gonna claim two spreads, if we can…”
“…and register it in their names?”
Strep nodded in dull embarrassment.
“But, Lambert, you’re signing falsely. You’re bound to be discovered sooner or later. Your own claim might be disqualified.”
Strep swallowed hard. “Mr. Torquist will take care of it. I trust Mr. Torquist. Don’t you?” he demanded, taking a feeble offensive. “You wouldn’t even be here if it weren’t for Horace Torquist.”
Emmalee gave up. There was nothing she could do about it now. Yet her suspicions were confirmed, and there was something unspeakably sad about a good man’s fall from grace, to say nothing of his taking others over the precipice with him.
She spent the rest of the day setting up Torquist’s tent and unloading his wagon. The wagonmaster had gone out to reconnoiter possible plots of farmland, and Emmalee was glad of his absence. She felt morally compelled to speak to him about the dangers of his scheme, and she also had to discuss with him the nature of her duties here in Olympia. If, somehow, she could arrange to work for him part of the time, leaving the remainder of her days free, then she might have a chance to make some progress on her own. Obviously, money was going to be a real problem.
First things first: get the land.
By late afternoon Torquist had still not returned. Seeing no sign of Randy either, Emmalee decided to take a look around for herself. She left Arcady, walking south along the banks of the Big Two-Hearted. The slow, mournful murmur of the river put her into a peaceful, dreamy mood and she strolled along happily, conscious of little but gentle sun, easy wind, and the perfume of flowers and tall, waving grass. Looking up, she saw a thick grove of willows in the distance, a wild cluster of trees growing along the river, and caught a glimpse of Conestoga canvas behind the leaves. Some of Pennington’s people she figured. Approaching more closely, she heard the sounds of many axes and the occasional instructions and comments of people at work.
Were the ranchers building shelters already? They hadn’t even claimed land yet. And willow was hardly sound construction material. The wood was too soft.
Curious, Emmalee left the riverbank and ducked into the tall grass, bending down and making her way toward the grove. She slipped into the trees and edged toward a small clearing. There she saw a group of women cutting branches from the willows and stripping them of bark. The branches were white, wet and slippery when stripped. Emmalee was puzzled. The branches were too wet to be used as kindling and too weak for construction. Moreover, several other women were chopping the branches into yard-long lengths and sharpening one end of each length into a point.
Weapons or spears of some kind? Was Pennington counting on a fight over the land claims?
Then, behind one of the wagons, Emmalee sensed movement, saw the prancing hoofs of horses, and into her line of sight came three riders.
Otis, Pennington’s rangy head scout.
A small, mean-looking man whom Emmalee did not recognize.
And Lottie Pennington, dressed in a pink frock and a matching pink bonnet. She was mounted sidesaddle on a magnificent black stallion.
It was Garn Landar’s horse!
Emmalee was as astounded by that as she was puzzled by the activity taking place. Would Garn have gambled or sold his horse? Or would he have…given it to Lottie?
Lottie looked demure and, as usual, faintly bored. Otis and the other man sat tall in their saddles, surveying the working women with the air of impatient supervisors. Whatever was happening was something of considerable importance. Emmalee edged closer to the clearing to see if she could find out what it was.
“Is this all you’ve got done?” the small man was demanding of one of the women. She was solid and sunburned, holding a hatchet in one gnarled hand.
“You don’t like it, get down off that horse and lend a hand,” the woman retorted with spirit. “We’re doing the best we can.”
“Come now,” said Otis conciliatingly. “We’re all in this together. It’s just that we’re going to need over a thousand stakes.”
Stakes. The word touched a chord in Emmalee’s memory but she didn’t have time to think about it just then because Garn’s horse caught her scent, neighed anxiously, and Lottie cried out: “There’s somebody in the trees! There!”
Emmalee turned to run, but she didn’t get far. The little mean-faced man, moving fast, leaped from his horse, dashed into the willows, grabbed Emmalee, and dragged her back into the clearing. He had snaggly teeth and a very hard hand.
“You’re hurting me,” Emmalee said, trying to pry his fingers from her arm.
“Well, I do declare,” said Lottie, laughing, as she recognized Emmalee.
“Let her go, Alf,” ordered Otis. “What are you doing here?” he asked casually but without amusement.
“I was out for a walk,” Emmalee flared, rubbing her arm and glaring at Alf, who grinned malevolently back at her. “Anything wrong with that?”
“You’re pretty far from Arcady,” Lottie pointed out. “I should think you’d have had enough walking in Kansas and Colorado.”
The women who’d been cutting branches stared suspiciously. Emmalee was sure she’d stumbled upon something of importance. Something that she ought to be able to figure out.
“You like this horse?” Lottie smirked. “I see that you’re looking at it.”
“These are serious days for us,” Otis told her sharply. “Business first, pleasure later. Your father’s warned you.”
The Pennington girl flushed, frowned.
“Miss…Alden, wasn’t it?” Otis asked smoothly. “Let me give you a ride back to town.”
“You sure, Oats?” the small man asked.
“Yeah, Kaiserhalt, I’m sure. Shut up.”
Alf Kaiserhalt seemed disappointed, giving Emmalee a glance that said, Well, your luck, you got off easy this lime.
“The rest of you get back to work now,” Lottie told the women, who scowled at her contemptuously. They didn’t like her any better than Emmalee did. These rough-hewn, hardworking women, Emmalee realized, were much like herself. Although they regarded her as farmer and enemy, they knew as well as she, without having to express it, the shallow nature of Lottie Pennington’s soul.
And they probably wondered, as did Emmalee, how Lottie had come by such a fine horse. Emmalee’s mind flashed back to the time she’d seen Lottie and Garn talking behind the wagon in Denver, on the day of Bernice Creel’s funeral. She also recalled that Garn had promised to get Torquist’s train to Denver before Pennington’s party arrived, a guarantee upon which he had not delivered. Perhaps he had never planned to deliver! His remote manner now, his conspiratorial attitude, were more than grounds for suspicion.
Had it all been some vast scheme to defeat the farmers from the beginning? Garn’s “getting fired” in St. Joe, his fortuitous presence on the Torquist train, the little cabal around the table in the general store, and this puzzling scene in the willows?
But Myrtle Higgins wouldn’t be involved, would she? wondered Emmalee.
Otis rode a glossy chestnut
roan, upon which he pulled Emmalee with scarcely less harshness than Alf Kaiserhalt had shown. He spurred the horse lightly, guiding it out of the grove and back upriver toward Arcady.
“So you made it over the mountains?” he asked, quite friendly now. “What did you come poking around for? Looking for dogies, or what?”
Emmalee remembered her humiliation by Pennington in the Schuyler Hotel in St. Joe.
“What’s the big mystery about cutting a few branches off trees?” she shot back.
Otis laughed. “There’s a lot at stake. Every small advantage might count.”
Suddenly Emmalee pieced things together. Stakes. Those women had been fashioning name stakes for markers on the day of the land rush. Tell had mentioned having stakes to place on the four corners of each plot of land that was claimed. Pennington’s people would have their markers ready; Torquist’s might not. He and his men were out surveying the land now, while the women were busy unpacking.
I’ll have to get them started making stakes, Emmalee realized. Nobody’s even thought of it.
She was a little apprehensive. A lot of the women were envious of her for having been able to ride a good deal of the way to Denver in Ebenezer Creel’s wagon. Many of them were not entirely convinced that the incident behind those boulders had been Garn Landar’s fault.
And Emmalee had to admit that they were not completely wrong.
“You know, you sure are one purty little gal,” Otis was saying.
“I’m happy that you think so.”
“Are you? Well, you caught my eye that first day in St. Joe and I figured, ‘Yep, she’s got a lot of spunk, she’ll make it.’”
“Did you?”
“Sure. I can tell. Whyn’t you leave them plowboys an’ come with us? Give us a year, maybe two, an’ we ranchers’ll be runnin’ this whole territory.”
The Passionate and the Proud Page 18
