Medicine Wheel (11 page)

Serena reached back and took his hand. “How sad.”

“I guess it would seem so. I just never thought about it that much. I never knew my mother and it’s hard to miss someone you never knew. She was only nineteen, and I do wonder sometimes what she would be like now or what life would have been like. But I couldn’t have had better parents than Aunt Nancy and Uncle El, and the Judge always kept me in his life, made sure I got to know my brothers. He never let me forget we were family and demanded that I spend time in town. I still can’t miss Sunday dinner at the Judge’s without accounting for it.”

“So you come from a line of abolitionists?”

“Oh yes, and I’m kind of proud of that. And Republicans . . . except Cam. He’s a Democrat, which makes for some interesting Sunday dinners. I don’t have much interest in politics.”

Serena inched nearer to him and rested her head on his shoulder, still clinging to his hand. Thad tried to pretend this was the most natural thing in the world, while his heart hammered in his chest.

“Do you have a girlfriend?” Serena asked.

“Not really. You have a boyfriend?”

“Not really.”

“Ever had a girlfriend?”

It embarrassed him to admit it, but he replied, “Not really. I’ve taken a few girls to barn dances and the like, but I’ve always had so much work with the animal care and helping Uncle El, I haven’t had much social life.”

“How’d you get time to meet me today?”

He grinned sheepishly and blushed noticeably. “Uh, I’m fixing fence . . . in the north pasture.”

Serena laughed and looked up at him and, her eyes twinkling mischievously, said, “And I decided I liked you because you were the least devious person I’d ever met. I sure had you wrong. You’re as bad as I am. Maybe you’d better rethink this business of not being a lawyer.”

He shrugged. “Sorry to disappoint you. I just couldn’t stand the idea of not seeing you again. Besides, I did fix a little fence before I rode off to meet you.”

She put her hand behind his head and gently pulled it toward her. Their lips met, and she kissed him softly. “A secret? I’ve never had a boyfriend. Ever.”

“I’d like to make an application.” This time his head moved toward hers, and he kissed her with fervor.

“Application accepted.”

She lay back on the poncho, and he leaned over her and they kissed and caressed and touched tentatively, but although Thad was keenly aware of the coals smoldering in his loins now, he did not explore her most private places. He would never offend or disrespect her.

Abruptly, Serena slipped from his embrace and got up. Obviously flustered and breathing heavily, she said, “I have to go. Papa will wonder what’s taken me so long in town.”

At this moment she looked like a frightened deer. He rose and took her in his arms. “But when will I see you again?”

“I . . . I don’t know. It’s so complicated and I’m confused.”

“But it’s simple. We want to see each other, spend time together. You said I’m your boyfriend. Remember?”

“I don’t know . . . I wasn’t thinking.”

“When?”

“When?”

“When will I see you? We have to talk about things, and we have so much to learn about each other. I want to know everything about you.”

She hesitated. “Tuesday. It will be a little later. About two o’clock. There will be too many questions if I miss dinner.”

23

T
HAD
SAT
ON
the hub of the medicine wheel, what he now thought of as the altar. He had become convinced that the focal point of the circle held religious significance for the Kansa. He supposed there could have been animal sacrifices made there—or even human in ancient times—but he preferred to think not.

Serena should be here soon. It was mid-morning, and he was an hour early. This was their fifth meeting—yes, he kept count—and he always arrived ahead of the scheduled rendezvous. He loved the calm and serenity of the place and was lulled by the whisper of the tall grasses waving in the ever present breeze and had come to understand the spell that the medicine wheel had cast upon Serena. But, most of all, he did not want to miss a moment’s time with his special ‘girlfriend’ as he teasingly called her. He was ‘boyfriend’ to her.

Today, they would have most of the day together. The entire Belmont family sans Serena was attending a festival sponsored by the Riley County United Church Council in Manhattan, and Serena had generously offered to handle evening chores by herself. Her father had objected only mildly because he had been invited to give the featured sermon at the post-supper tent meeting. Thad had taken the day off from ranch work to tend to vague vet calls.

“Hello, boyfriend,” came a soft, seductive voice from behind him.

Thad nearly fell off the hub. He turned to see Serena smiling broadly, almost within reach, her arms loaded with a blanket and basket of breads and fruits, and no doubt some ham. “You scared me half to death,” he scolded.

She moved in beside him and kissed his cheek as he got up from his stone perch. “Poor boyfriend,” she said. “I didn’t mean to frighten you.”

“I guess I was day dreaming. And you move so quietly . . . like a damned Indian.”

“I am that. Among other things,” she laughed, as she moved toward their shady oasis beneath the cottonwood. “You hungry?”

“Not yet. It’s an hour yet before noon. I brought a bottle of wine and some cheeses, so with the feast you have stashed in your basket, we should have plenty to eat. But I want to try out my new ferrotype camera.”

Serena put her basket down and spread out the soft cotton blanket. “Your what?”

“My camera.” He picked up a burlap sack and began to unpack the contents. Holding up a black metal box with short tubes extending like elongated eyes, he said, “This is what some call a tintype camera.” He pulled it apart revealing an accordion-looking fabric. “This is the bellows. It’s not as complicated as it looks. The plate will take four photographs, and then I take them to my emulsion laboratory . . . my closet actually,” he smiled, “and I can produce four tintypes of the same picture.”

He plucked out what appeared to be a jumble of sticks and began assembling them. “My tripod to rest the camera on. The legs are hinged, so I can fold them up and carry them with me.”

“So, Mr. Photographer, just what are you going to take pictures of?”

“As if you didn’t know. My favorite subject. Why don’t you go over and sit on the hub. I’ve just got six plates, so we’ll have to pick our scenes carefully.”

For the next hour they set up poses, laughing until they were breathless as Serena made faces and clowned in front of the camera. He remarked that she would make a fine actress, which should serve her well as a trial lawyer. He was confident these would be among the best photographs he had taken. The sun was perfect, and the subject glowed with her flawless beauty.
 

Before they finished, he had collected three plates of Serena tintypes, including one with her posed near the hub of the medicine wheel, another of her standing winsomely in the cottonwood grove and a final pose with a backdrop overlooking the Big Blue River Valley. At Serena’s insistence, she had, following his precise instructions, taken one of him.

Thad carefully wrapped each of the plates in soft cotton cloths and placed them in a compact wooden box he had purchased for that purpose, and put away the equipment. Then he joined Serena on the blanket and emancipated the bottle of red wine from the saddle bags he had carried with him up the trail. He dug deeper and plucked out two small tin cups. “Not fancy,” he said, “but they work. I don’t know anything about wine. This comes from the Flint Hills Winery. Aunt Nancy says their wines are kind of bitter but as good as you’ll find in Kansas probably.”

“Papa doesn’t believe in imbibing in the spirits,” she said, her face turning serious.

“Oh, God. I hadn’t thought about that. I’m sorry. I guess I just assumed—”

She suddenly grinned brightly. “I said Papa doesn’t believe in imbibing. We have wine at my aunt’s on occasion. I enjoy it.”

He shook his head. “Got me again.”

They sat down on the blanket, and Thad poured a bit of wine into a cup and handed it to Serena. Then he poured some into his own cup.

Serena lifted her cup. “A toast to the medicine wheel.”

Thad clanked his cup to Serena’s, and they both sipped at their wine. Thad grimaced at the bitter taste, but Serena seemed to savor it, smiling benignly. She raised her cup again. “To boyfriends and girlfriends.”

Thad found that the second drink was not quite so repelling. Serena scooted closer, and he wrapped his arm around her. She lifted her face and they kissed, lingeringly and deeply. He tossed his half-filled cup in the grass, and hers followed.

Serena lay back and pulled him gently with her, their bodies pressed tightly and their lips and hands roaming into territory neither had explored before. Her hips thrust against his, and he feared he might explode.

Serena pulled back slightly and their eyes met, sharing something just short of desperation. “Yes,” she said simply and moved away and began slipping out of her riding britches.

Silently, he disrobed and soon they were both naked on the blanket, their clothes scattered helter-skelter at the edges. Serena’s body was even more incredible than his imagination had conjured, lithe and smooth and dusky with small, tapered breasts and dark nipples. Somehow he did not feel shy as her eyes studied him with interest and, hopefully, approval. They lingered a moment on his swollen member, and then she said, “This is my first time.”

“Mine, too,” he replied as he moved on top of her.

Their coupling was clumsy and urgent, and after she helped him enter, she winced and emitted a soft groan, but there was no stopping him now and he drove hard and deep, suddenly erupting his seed.

Afterward, they lay naked and silent on the blanket, staring skyward for some minutes.

“I hurt you,” he said, reaching for her hand. “I’m sorry.”

She turned her head toward him. “Don’t be silly. That is the way of things. Other girls have told me. It will be okay next time.”

“Next time?”

She laughed and moved to him and tentatively danced her fingertips along his phallus which responded instantly. “I have heard of this,” she purred, as she mounted him. “Don’t move.”

He did not argue and let her ride. Soon she shuddered and sighed and took him with her.

After that they agreed it was time for lunch, and, leaving their clothes strewn on the ground, ate heartily and made more progress toward emptying the wine bottle. They discovered they were both drowsy, and they napped in each other’s arms for a spell before resuming their lovemaking.

Spring 1885

24

T
HE
N
EMESIS
ARRIVED
home after attending services at the First Methodist Church and dining at a luncheon served by the church ladies afterward. He always felt Father’s quiet presence as he sat among a congregation of the righteous and joined in the singing of the hymns and the recitation of the prayers. And while he was not by instinct a social creature, he enjoyed the fellowship with the church members and circulated congenially before and after lunch.

But later the vulture carrying the black mood would descend upon him, and he would become anxious and agitated, especially when he was embarked on an important mission of vengeance.

Upon entering the house he headed directly for the rocking chair and was soon lost in his obsessive, rhythmic rocking, his mind wandering and finally finding its way to the day Father had returned and ultimately led him to his first rendering of vengeance and the beginning of a purposeful life. Yes, he remembered it clearly now, as events unfolded before his eyes.

It was the third anniversary of Father’s death, and the boy, at age seventeen and on the verge of manhood, had entered the barn, as he always did on that date. He had no special objective there beyond revisiting the worst moment of his young life. He had no desire to forget, and the moments that preceded Father’s death and the instant his mother rammed the fork into Father’s back replayed again and again in his mind. He would inevitably become excited and be driven to relieve his urgent need as he had that fateful day.

This day, though, Father visited for the first time. It happened midway in the crescendo of his frenzy. The mixed tobacco-sweat smell crept into his nostrils, and his eyes commenced searching the seeming vastness of the old barn. He felt no fear, only curiosity and a sense that something very significant was about to happen. He waited for some moments, watching and listening, savoring Father’s smell. Father was very near when he spoke, as he would be in all of their future meetings.

“It is time, my son, to take vengeance on the disobedient slut who does not deserve to be your mother,” Father proclaimed.

This was the moment the boy had been waiting for. He understood Father’s message. “I am ready,” he replied.

“Can you do it? Can you kill her?”

“Yes, I can. I have thought about it for many months.”

“How will you do this?”

“I will get her into the barn, and then I will take the bullwhip to her. I have practiced for many hours here at this very spot.”

“I have watched. You are very skilled.”

“After she has taken her whipping, I will mount her, and then she will die with the tines of the pitchfork buried in her soft belly, and she will not die quickly.”

“You will have to leave this place.”

“I have thought about this. I have completed high school, and my teachers praise my work and ability. There is a business school in St. Louis, and I will attempt to enroll there for its two-year program.”

“What will you do with the body?”

“I will bury it in the woods near the river. I have searched out a spot where she will never be found. The house and land will have to be abandoned. I will just disappear and take the two horses with me for sale in St. Louis. I am not afraid to work, and I am smarter than most.”

“You will do well, and I will be near when you need me.”