Nevada Barr - Bittersweet

“Go on. Go play with Moss Face, air yourself off. The way you’ve been behaving lately, I can do without your help in the kitchen tonight.” Again the accusing look. “Go on now, you’re moping around. Run around some, maybe you’ll sleep better.” Still he hung about, never out of reach of her skirttail. She looked about for something to occupy him for a while.

“There.” She pointed to the eastern road. Karl and Coby rode half a mile out, coming into the stop from the opposite direction as the freightwagons. Shadows crossed the valley, black fingers reaching over the road and touching the mountains to the east.

“Run and meet Karl and Coby,” Sarah said to her son. “If you ask Karl nice, I bet he’ll give you a ride in.”

Matthew looked down the road. “It’ll be dark.” There was just the beginning of a whine in his voice, and it firmed Sarah’s resolution.

“Not if you run. Scoot!” She swatted his behind and he took off as if all the devils in hell were after him, calling, “Karl! Coby! Karl!” at the top of his lungs before he had run as far as the gate.

The riders and the freightwagons arrived at the stop within minutes of each other, and Karl and Coby helped with the unhitching.

Jerome and Charley had started driving mule and rig over the desert early in the year, and now made a regular run. Round Hole had seen them several times a month since February. Both were in their forties, redfaced, round headed, and thick through the neck and shoulders. Jerome did most of the talking for the two of them; Charley seemed to be happy with the role of straight man and audience. They were immensely strong: one night, on a bet, the two of them had lifted an eight-year-old mule and its rider. They’d turned as blackfaced as storm clouds, and their necks had grown even thicker and redder, but they’d done it.

Matthew hung around the men, getting in the way, until Coby lifted him up onto the boxes in the back of one of the wagons, where he wouldn’t get stepped on. When they started to the house without him, he cried out so frantically that Karl swatted his behind. “Don’t scream like that, Matthew. Not unless you are really hurt. It’s like the little boy who cried ‘Wolf.’ Remember that story? I will always come at a run when you scream, so will your mother and Coby.”

The younger man nodded. “If you’re not in trouble when I get there, you will be when I leave.” Coby smacked his fist into his palm, but there was no malice in it and it helped take the sting out of Karl’s lecture.

Sarah served the after-dinner coffee on the porch. It was a brisk spring night, the air fresh and sweet with the smell of sage, and the sky close with stars. Coby was indoors at the bar, writing a letter to his creditor in Elko. Karl, Jerome, and Charley sat with their chairs tilted back against the side of the house, their ankles propped on the porch rail, all in like postures. The wagoners smoked pipes, the bowls glowing orange when they drew on the tobacco.

Sarah handed the coffee cups to Karl and he passed them to the other men before she sat down on the top step and folded her hands around her own mug.

“Do you want me to get your shawl?” Karl offered.

“No thanks, Karl. I’m fine.”

Jerome winked at the exchange. “You’ll spoil ’er,” he warned. He struck a match on the sole of his partner’s boot and grinned. Screwing up his face, one eye completely closed, he sucked the flame into the pipe. The light showed Matthew hunched, small in the corner, almost under Charley’s chair. He was hugging his knees, listening to the talk. The pointed snout of the coyote protruded from behind him, his neckerchief red in the sudden light.

Sarah’s eye caught her son’s. “Isn’t it time somebody was doing his chores?”

Matthew curled down smaller and busied himself with rescuing the dog’s tail: Moss Face had swished it precariously near the spot where Charley’s chair leg was bound to come crashing down eventually.

“Matthew,” Sarah said in her high-priority tone. “Get those plates scraped. It’ll only take you a minute, and Moss Face would probably appreciate the leavings. Go on now, honey.”

“I want to stay,” Matthew said in a voice meant to be too low to be heard.

“Go on now.”

With agonizing slowness, the child uncurled himself and crawled under the propped-up legs of the men. He crept all the way out, flat on his belly, and lay still, gazing out through the bars into the stars-pricked darkness.

“Matthew, I’m going to get mad in half a minute if you don’t get a move on.” Sarah rapped the wood with her knuckles.

“Mrs. Ebbitt,” Matthew muttered peevishly under his breath.

It was not so low it didn’t reach Karl’s ears, poised as he was above the boy. His chair slammed down and he planted one foot on either side of the prone child. “That does it.” He lifted Matthew and strode into the house.

Sarah maintained her seat on the steps, but winced every time the crack of Karl’s hand on her son’s bare bottom sounded through the open door. Several minutes later, Karl reemerged.

“Did you send him to bed?” she asked.

“No. He’s scraping plates.”

Sarah met and held Karl’s eyes for a moment until, conscious of the wagoners’ attention, she went on to talk of other things.

Later, Karl helped Sarah with the dishes, a habit he maintained despite the ribbing he got. His sleeves rolled up, he scrubbed the bottom of a cast-iron kettle while Sarah dried the crockery and put it away. They had been worrying the subject of Matthew’s sullenness all through the clean-up.

“Where is he?” Karl asked. “Is he still sulking over his spanking?”

Sarah hung a cup on one of the nails over the kitchen counter. “I imagine he’s probably out with Jerome and Charley. Whenever they’re through here lately, he can’t leave them alone. He loves listening to the men. He’s getting to be quite a little man himself. Did you ever notice him copying you? The way you walk? Sometimes he’ll walk beside you all straight and long-stepping, just like you do.”

Karl laughed, pleased. “He’d better not pattern himself on me.”

“Why not? You turned out to be a fine man.”

Karl answered her with a wry smile.

“Speaking of you, tomorrow’s the coach from Bishop. Ross’ll be driving, so you better plan to be somewhere else.”

“I’m tired of leaving you when the old-timers come through.”

“I know. I’m okay here. We’ve got Coby now, and he’s a worker.”

“I’ll go over to Fish Springs Ranch. I’ve been meaning to look at a couple of bulls that Ernie Fex has, anyway. I’ve learned a lot about cattle from Coby and from the books we ordered. I think I know what to look for. I’d like to try to improve our herd. What do you think?”

“It never cost anything to look.” Finished drying, she draped her dishcloth through the oven-door handle. “Do you think he’s coming down with something? He’s a good boy. I don’t know what’s eating at him. I’ve tried to talk to him but he clams up. Two nights this week he woke me, crying-nightmares about the most awful things. Graves opening and the dead bodies coming out. Fever’ll sometimes bring on bad dreams, but he never felt warm or anything.”

“I guess we’ll just have to wait and see if he outgrows it.” Karl heaved the kettle onto the still-warm stove and swabbed it out with a towel so it wouldn’t rust. “I’d better be getting to bed. Good night.”

Sarah took his hand and laid it against her cheek. The scarred palm was rough and familiar. “Tell Jerome and Charley good night for me. Their beds are made up and there are candles on the bar. And will you send Matthew in? It’s past time he was in bed.”