Walk on Earth a Stranger
Page 5

“For a family of three, like yours. But even one person needs at least two hundred.” He shakes his head. “There’s got to be a different way.”
I know from his tone, as surely as I know Mama’s locket doesn’t contain a lick of brass, that Jefferson wants to go west more than anything. “You’re going to run away,” I say.
“Maybe. I don’t know.” He scuffs his bare foot against the step, sending a wave of sludge over the edge. “I could take the sorrel mare. Hunt my way there. Or work for somebody else, taking care of their stock. It’s just that . . . It’s just . . .”
“Jeff?” I peer close to try to figure him. He has a wide mouth that jumps into a smile faster than lightning. But there’s nothing of smiling on his face right now.
“Remember the year the creek dried up, and we caught fifty tadpoles in the stagnant pool?” he says softly.
“Sure,” I say, though I have no idea why he’d bring it up. “I remember you dropping a handful down my blouse.”
“And I remember you screaming like a baby.”
I punch him in the shoulder.
He jerks backward, staring at me in mock disapproval. “Your punches didn’t used to hurt so much.”
“I like to get better at things.”
His gaze drifts far away. Rubbing absently at his shoulder, he says, “You’re my best friend, Lee.”
“I know.”
“We’re too old for school. I only come to see you.”
“I know.”
All at once he turns toward me and grasps my mittened hands in his bare ones. “Come west with me,” he blurts.
I open my mouth, but nothing comes out.
“Marry me. Or . . . I mean . . . We could tell people we’re married. Brother and sister, maybe! Whatever you want. But you’re like me. With your daddy sick, I know it’s really you working that claim, same way I work Da’s. I know it’s your own two hands as built that place up.” His grip on my hands is so tight it’s almost unbearable. “This is our chance to make our own way. It’s only right that— Why are you shaking your head?”
His words brought a stab of hope so pure and quick it was like a spur in the side. But now I’ve a sorrow behind my eyes that wants to burst out, hot and wet. Jefferson is partly right: I’m the one who makes our claim work. He just doesn’t know how much.
“Leah?”
I sigh. “Here’s where you and I are different. I love my mama and daddy. I can’t leave them. And yes, it’s my claim as much as anyone’s. I’m proud of it. I can’t leave it neither.”
He releases my hands. Together, we look out over the snow-dusted yard to find the others staring at us. They saw us holding hands, for sure and certain. But we ignore them. We’re used to ignoring them.
“You might not have a choice,” he says. “If your daddy wants to go to California—”
That stab of hope again. “Mama will convince him not to. He’s too sick.”
“But if you go—”
The school bell peals, calling us inside.
“We’ll talk later,” I say, more than a little glad to let the subject go. I’ve lots of thinking to do. In fact, I do so much thinking during the next hours that I’m useless for helping the little ones with their sums, and when Mr. Anders calls on me to recite the presidents, I mix up Madison and Monroe.
I drive home as soon as school lets out, not bothering to say bye to Jefferson, though I wave from a distance. I need to get away, and fast, find some open air for laying out all my thoughts about California and gold and going west, not to mention the stunning and undeniable fact that Jefferson just asked me to marry him.
As offers go, it’s not the kind a girl dreams about while fingering the linens from her hope chest. I’m not even sure he meant it, the way he stumbled over it so badly.
I’ve thought about marriage—of course I have—but no one seems to have taken a shine to me. It’s no secret I spend my days squatting in the creek bed or hefting a pickax or mucking the barn, that I have an eagle eye and a steady shot that brings in more game than Daddy ever did, even during his good spells. I might be forgiven my wild ways if I was handsome, but I’m not. My eyes are nice enough, as much gold as brown, just like Mama’s. But I have a way of looking at people that makes them prickly, or so Jefferson says, and he always says it with a grin, like it’s a compliment.
One time only did I mourn to Daddy about my lack of prospects. He just shrugged and said, “Strong chin, strong heart.” Then he kissed me quick on the forehead. I never complained again. My daddy knows my worth.
I suppose Jefferson does too, and my heart hurts to think of him leaving and me staying. But the truth is I’ve never thought of him in a marrying kind of way. And with an awful proposal like that, I don’t know that Jefferson’s too keen on the idea either.
A gunshot cracks through the hills, tiny and miles distant. A minute later, it’s followed by a second shot. Someone must be out hunting. I wish them luck.
By the time my wagon comes in view of the icy creek and the faint track that winds through the bare oaks toward home, I decide there’s no help for it but to talk everything out with Mama and Daddy. The three of us have some shared secrets among ourselves, sure, but we have none from one another.
Peony tosses her head, as if sensing my thoughts. No, it’s the surrounding woods that have put a twitch in her. They are too silent, too still.
“Everything’s fine, girl,” I say, and my voice echoes back hollowly.
As the leafless trees open up to reveal our sprawling homestead, right when I yell “Haw!” to round Peony toward the barn, something catches my eye.
A man’s boot. Worn and wrinkled and all alone, toppled into a snowbank against the porch.
“Daddy?” I whisper, frozen for the space of two heartbeats.
I leap from the bench, and my skirt catches on the wheel spoke, but I rip right through and sprint toward the house. I don’t get far before I fall to my knees, bent over and gasping.
Because Daddy lies on his back across the porch steps, legs spread-eagled, bootless. Crimson pools beneath his head and drips down the steps—tiny rapids of blood. His eyes are wide to the sky, and just above them, like a third eye in a brow paler than snow, is a dark bullet hole.
“Mama!” I yell, and then I yell it again. I can’t take my eyes off Daddy’s face. He seems so surprised. So alive, except for that unblinking stare.
What should I do? Drag him away before he ruins the porch, maybe. Or put his boots back on. Why did Daddy go outside without his boots?
My hands shake with the need to do something. To fix something. My eyes search the steps, the porch, the wide-open doorway, but I can only find the one boot, shoved into the snowbank. “Mama? Where are Daddy’s boots?” My voice is shrill in the winter air, almost a scream.
I use the porch railing to pull myself to my feet. If I can just find that blasted boot, everything will be fine. Why isn’t Mama answering?
The world shifts, and I stumble hard against the railing.
Two gunshots. I heard two. “Mama,” I whisper.
I start running. Through the drawing room, the bedroom, the kitchen still messy from supper. Upstairs to the dormer room where I sleep, then back down again. Sunshine has broken through the clouds, streaming light through our windows. Mama’s touches of love are everywhere—the blue calico curtains of my bedroom, the pine boughs winding our otherwise plain banister, and poking from the vase on our mantel, flowers made from wrapping paper and stained yellow with wild mustard. Yesterday’s venison stew, still warm on the box stove.