A Sweetness to the Soul (59 page)

A cloudburst and flash flood and his timing for kindness wiped his freighter out. His ability to scramble from his team and up the rocky side saved his life. That, and his over-worked guardian angel.

He made his way to me, asked first about my safety. We shared another bond having stepped just ahead of fate. “Beats swimmin’ with bow-legged women,” J. W. told me, his eyes sparkling.

“And I’m not even,” I said, and laughed as his words telescoped me back all those years to his misplaced toast the day we became engaged.

The men sat for hours with him later in the bar, pouring Stubling’s liquid for him, shaking their heads in dismay. They recalled other flash floods they’d seen though none at quite so close a distance.

The fading red and yellow stage from The Dalles arrived; meals were served. I found a brief moment to tell Joseph when he returned with the Bakeoven grade crew. His jaws clenched tightly and he held me close. Then in a rare public expression of affection, he kissed me tenderly before striding to J. W. to thank him expansively at the bar.

During the evening, I caught Joseph’s eyes once or twice across the room as he chatted with the men; swimming eyes that spied everything, it seemed, then added a softening touch. He lifted a graying eyebrow and sent an “arrow smile” he called them, shot over the heads of others, an expression of comfort when words were not possible to share.

I was anxious for the quiet of our room where I could sort out my thoughts of this day of chance and sweet survival.

“You’re like a protective bird,” he told me later in our new bedroom, “nesting.” I picked a thread from the lace window curtains and tightened the corner on the coverlet before pulling the Hudson Bay blanket smoothly over the down mattress. Sunmiet and Anne still urge me to use Pendleton blankets in the Sherar House, but I have always liked the whiteness of Hudson Bay’s and so stand firm. A cobweb had attached itself to the oak picture frame hanging forward from the wall.

“Or that sandpiper Sunmiet called you,” Joseph continued, “always managing to stay one trace ahead of the waves they chase while cleaning the beach.”

I settled, finally, at the dressing table staring at the dark huckleberry eyes staring back.

A breeze from across the Deschutes River stirred the lacy bedroom window curtains and fluttered the dreamcatcher’s feather as it hung on the wainscoted wall. My eye caught the feather’s movement. A dreamcatcher: leather and sinew, feather and beads, history and hope: a gift from Sunmiet and Inanuks.

“At least we can still catch dreams,” I said, putting an epitaph on the day. Looking up, I caught my husband’s gaze in the mirror as he watched me from the bed. My eyes glued to his, I gently tugged on the tortoise shell combs, felt my hair fall like summer rain over my narrow shoulders and pale chemise, stopping just a whisper from the floor.

“A day like this one needs a predictable ending, don’t you think?” I said.

“Strength and flexibility too,” he added.

“We’ll replace J. W.’s outfit?” We’d been at this trail-crossing before.

Joseph nodded agreement, said nothing as he watched me. Like a blind woman untangling loose yarn, I ran my fingers through the dark strands working out the tiny snags, comforted by the nightly
ritual. I reached for the silver brush that lay on the dresser cloth next to one of my carved animals. The brush had been an extravagant fifth wedding anniversary present from Joseph. His extravagance worries me less. I find I’m enjoying the spoils of his expansive heart and generous spirit. The silver handle of the brush felt cool and soothing.

As I brushed, hand over hand, I considered: I am not yet forty-five years old, and once again death has slipped its cold shadow beside me and I hadn’t even the slightest inkling or premonition that it lurked nearby. It does not bode well for a woman who seeks control, works still on letting Someone larger plan for her life.

“Coulda been cold as a wagon tire,” J. W. had told Joseph philosophically at the bar. “We beat the Dutch for sure.” I think J. W. knew he’d carry more pounds now; like me, learn that surviving put an extra burden on a soul, came with responsibility saddled on its back. This time, though, we all survived and none of us carries the survivor’s guilt of living life fully while someone we loved could not.

“Not sure how ye can look so settled after such an unsettling day,” Joseph said. “I know you’re resilient, but even strong and solid trees should look a little windblown following a storm!”

“I learned to cope by leanin’ into the wind,” I said, “just like you told me.”

In the mirror I watched him cross his arms behind his head and lean into the maple headboard. Joseph smiled, then became serious. “Ye mean everything to me,” he said. “All the dreams, all the things I hope to do yet, hold no value if I lose ye. You’re still a huckleberry above a persimmon. Always will be to me.”

I’m still learning to accept compliments and did nothing with that one out loud, felt the fullness of belonging, inside.

He watched me a while longer and then I saw this gleam in his eye; an idea, a vision forming in his head.

“What is it?” I said, wary, light. “Don’t you have to check corrals, the bridge, or whatever?”

“I’ve something else in mind,” he said, a grin forming.

“We’ve a houseful coming tomorrow, to celebrate the opening,” I protested. “Ella and Carrie and their broods, my brother, George … Sunmiet, her family. The De Moss Family Bards will arrive early to play … no time for anything but work or rest until they get here.”

By then, he stood behind me, smiling at my busyness. He lifted me by my shoulders and turned me to him, holding my face like precious crystal in his calloused hands. He kissed my forehead, brushed his gray beard against my skin. In a voice as deep and smooth as a cello, he said “I love you, Janie. Always have, always will. Let them all come tomorrow. Tonight, while it’s just the two of us, I want the first dance.”

Tears welled up behind my eyes.

“Here?” I asked, my heart pounding like we’d just begun our lives together. The breeze fluttered the dreamcatcher over the bed, separated the lace curtains to reveal the moonless night sky. Through the window I caught the fireflies of the fishermen’s fires near the scaffoldings, hoping for salmon and eels through the night. I hoped no one would be injured, lost to the water, wanted no more tragedy to add to this day. I heard a baby cry in its sleep, then quiet, safe for the night.

Joseph brought me back from the outside, into his presence. He touched his fingers to mine and began to hum “Sweet Betsy from Pike” as he pulled me to him. I felt the rough of his vest through my thin gown, the gentle touch of his hands at the small of my back. He curled my fingers in his and curled our hands to his heart, his chin lightly touching my head.

While the lamplight reflected off the mirror of our new bedroom, we danced. While the roar of the Sherar’s falls echoed off the rimrocks, we danced. Patsy lay at the foot of the bed, head on her paws, one eyebrow raised in question. The smell of my husband’s leather and our home’s new lumber rose like a comforting fragrance. Soft light surrounded us as we swept gingerly across the floor.

“I could not be happier in my life than I am at this moment,” I told him. Throat tight, I sunk into his chest.

I felt wetness on my cheek, felt him swallow. “And we might have missed it all if we hadn’t taken a chance, wanted this dance,” he said.

“I love you, too, Joseph Sherar,” I told him.

We adjusted a little, he for his leg and me for my height. We adapted, as we had and would need to, traveling the path laid out for us, turning it into our own. Joseph swirled me, lifted me off of my feet.

A hundred things awaited doing for tomorrow, but tonight, I’d take what I’d been given and would cope, supple and strong, thankful, as we danced on into the rest of our very full lives.

E
PILOGUE

J
ULY 1907

D
awn came like a baby’s breath: soft and sweet and warm. It blushed the river canyon with its soothing pink then spilled through the starched curtains into the bedroom where Joseph sat. He heard the Seth Thomas clock strike six just as the muted light brushed across his tired eyes and he closed the last of the leather-bound books. What a gift she’d left! And such a surprise! Ella had discovered them in the back of Jane’s closet while searching for the box holding her amethyst watch. Ella knew Jane would want to wear that watch this day.

Dusting the books off the night before, he’d slid into Jane’s leather chair beside the bed intending only to rest a moment before struggling to remove his boots. Instead, he’d read through the night, his boots still on.

Jane’s final notebook entry lay now balanced on his bony knees. “She’s the one,” he said out loud, his words causing the Irish Setter to raise his eyes to the man, cock his head to the voice. “She writes about this old man, his buildings and roads. But they were nothing. Nothing.” He shook his head in wonder. “She’s what’s held the coping saw with a steady hand.”

He shook his head again, this time in sadness. With his right
hand, Joseph lifted his left and rubbed some of the stiffness from it. His limbs were always stiff in the morning and then they seemed to tremble and shake with a life of their own. She had always massaged his hand at sunrise, kneading it like a yeast dough, helping him ease into the day as they talked. He wondered when she’d found the time to write all those words! “Had no idea how she felt about some of those things, Gus,” he told the dog who thumped his tail on the redwood floors at the sound of his name. “The watch, the dances, Sunmiet’s sweathouse. Even that old coping saw.” He shook his head. “Wonder why she stopped writing in ’93?” She had stopped fourteen years too soon, he thought.

Maybe there were other notebooks. “Have to ask her,” he said.

Before the words had even left his mouth, he felt the piercing pain of grief rise up to steal his breath, eclipse his heart. His eyes watered. He swallowed, let his head drop back against the chair. Remembering, the tears came, companions to the sobs that followed. He had no way to ask her now, nor ever hear her answer, on this earth. He cried silently, his head sunk into the chair, her chair. Her scent still lingered on the leather.

When he heard the knock on the door, he stopped himself.

“Father? You awake?”

“Awake,” he said, clearing his throat, his voice husky. He thumbed his eyes with his right hand.

“You need to come, Father.” Ella’s voice held urgency.

“I’ll get me cane,” he said, looking for it. “Be with you.” The journal fell from his knees as he struggled awkwardly from the leather chair, wiping his face, drying his hands on the trousers over his knees.

She unlatched the door to the bedroom to help him search. If she noticed he still wore his coat and vest of the night before, or that the bed had not been slept in, she said nothing. She simply located the hickory cane beneath the clutter of journals he’d spent the night reading. She didn’t take the time to tidy them up. Enclosed with a hurriedly tied sash, her nightrobe billowed out around her, a single braid dusted the floor as she bent to retrieve his cane.

“Have to keep track of it meself,” he said taking it from her, noting the pain in her eyes. “Now, what’s the bother?” he said kindly.

“They want to come in.”

“Who?”

“The Indians.”

“Do they now.” His voice held a hint of wonder.

“They’re standing outside, waiting. Guess that’s what they want. To come in.”

“Well, let’s go see, then,” he said with effort and leaned into his cane.

The two made their way down the stairs of the Sherar House followed by the setter who stopped behind them on the landing. Joseph gazed at the pink dawn pouring out into the canyon, lighting the faces of silent mourners that stretched beyond his sight toward the falls. Their falls. Her falls, too.

“Open ’em,” he directed Ella who padded in slippered feet to the doors, letting the new dawn pour in. At the sight of Joseph standing in the doorway behind Ella, a line began forming from the people waiting outside.

Sunmiet led, dressed in her best shell dress, a wide beaded belt tucking in her thickening waist, a woven basket hat on her head. Old women in their buckskins and wing dresses with soft doeskin moccasins on their feet followed her. Then the young women made their way, some with their own toddlers in tow, black hair shining, ermine skins lifted lightly from their braids by the morning breeze. All carried gifts of themselves.

Sunmiet moved up the steps of the house and quietly swayed through the doors of the dining room toward the parlor and her friend, her eyelashes blinking rapidly as she passed by Joseph.

Jane’s body lay on a hastily made coffin as it had since arriving from The Dalles hospital the afternoon before. Joseph had coped the coffin’s corners, pounded the nails himself.

“They’ve been out there all night,” Ella whispered to him, grabbing her robe tighter around her against the morning cool.

“Have they now,” he said. He wrapped his arms around his only daughter.

He had not sent them word. Should have, but he knew that they would know. He never knew how the word went out, but it always did.