The Last Letter (4 page)

Hoots of joy from Frank and the children startled Jeanie. She looked back at the family. They ran into the sun, past the sinking yolk, their bodies exploded blaze yellow, each outlined in black to mark where one golden body ended and another began.

Jeanie looked at Templeton and realized for the first time since he’d disrobed to wrap her feet that he was not properly dressed, that it would be shameful to someone with a suspicious mind.

“Uh, well…Mr. Templeton, I’ll be…” Jeanie had no words. She shook her head, ignored the scorching pain in her feet and limped toward the wagon. “I’m going now, Mr. Templeton. My family awaits!” Jeanie’s words had barely sailed out on prairie winds before she decided to ignore her screaming feet and whipped her body into a full-out run.

Jeanie tore across the land. Her children caught sight of her and sprinted toward her. When they reached each other, they collapsed in a massive hug. Jeanie pulled each of their faces to hers, kissing their dirty cheeks, eyes, hands, clutching them, kneading their arms, making sure each was actually alive.

“No more of that wandering,” Jeanie’s mouth was taut, her gasping breaths making her words choppy. “We have to stick together…we have to…“

Tommy yanked on Jeanie’s sleeve. “Can we have lamb chops tonight? And pancakes for breakfast. With Vermont maple syrup, like we love?”

Jeanie squinted down at him. “Now, Tommy, my, my, we discussed this matter repeatedly. You’re a ten-year-old young man, capable of grasping…“ Jeanie turned to be sure Templeton was out of earshot, “…our circumstances.”

“Ahhhh, but…“

Jeanie knelt in front of him. Anger sprouted from the fatigue and thirst that lingered, but she wouldn’t raise her voice. “Now Thomas Hart Arthur. We will have syrup yet again and I’m sure lamb will grace our table before long, but I am ordering you not to whine. We are in these dire straits for now, but only now. And I want this to be our last conversation on the matter.”

She squeezed Tommy’s arms and looked into James’ and Katherine’s faces to be sure they understood as well. “This station, our current position, these circumstances are not
who
we are—they are simply
where
we are right now.”

She gave Tommy’s arms one final squeeze then rose, determined that the conversation, the self-pity, and whining was at its end for no one wanted to mope and wail and bleat more than she. But, no one knew better than she that such acts would get them nowhere.

Frank came up behind Jeanie.

“All’s all right, right?” he said.

Jeanie felt the joy at reconnecting with her children diminished by the arrival of Frank. Realizing, admitting that, even in her own mind, shamed her. She had been angry he had taken so long to get water, that he put them in the position of nearly drowning. But, beyond the relief that she needed him to survive, she felt jarred by the notion that the love and romance she once held for him, seemed fully dissolved.

Frank pulled Jeanie into his chest. She went stiff in his arms, unable to soften into his embrace. The scent of sweat, and homemade soap filled her nose. The familiarity was comforting and that reassured her in the face of her general distaste for him. Maybe they could recapture the love that had once beguiled them both.

She remembered the water. “Frank, my Lord, the water.” She spoke into his shoulder, weakened with the thought of what had nearly happened. “Where did you go? Katherine. I lost her and we fell into a pond, we nearly died. When I stop and think—” Jeanie felt the calmness she’d forced upon herself disappear now that she was safe.

Frank gripped Jeanie’s shoulders and shook her as he looked directly into her face. “You look fine to me, Jeanie Arthur. Just peachy.”

The fear Jeanie had felt and ignored earlier finally settled in heavy, making her legs buckle. Frank caught her and she began to hyperventilate. Her shoulders heaved while she looked around to be sure the children weren’t watching them. “I’m scared. I don’t like the feeling. I’ve never felt this before, this—”

“Doesn’t matter, we’re fine, ignore it.” Frank pulled her into his body and hugged her so hard that her breath had no choice but to slow. She realized she didn’t want his reassurance.
He
was the one who left them in the position to be in danger.

Jeanie sniffled then pushed away. Templeton approached from the west. Jeanie’s feet stung with every heartbeat that rushed her blood past the lesions. And, there was shirtless Templeton. Frank’s face creased with what Jeanie knew must be confusion.

Jeanie lifted the hem of her skirts.

“My shoes. Mr. Templeton, he used his shirt…such a gentleman, this Templeton. We’ll have to go back to Yankton, to get some suitable footwear.” She turned back to Frank.

Frank glanced at Jeanie’s feet then waved her off, walking away, leaving her with Templeton. “You’ll make do. You’re the ‘Quintessential Housewife’ after all.”

Jeanie’s mouth gaped.

“You’re what?” Templeton said.

Frank turned back, hands spread to the sky like a preacher. “She’s the
real
‘Quintessential Housewife’, Templeton, the author? Didn’t she tell you?” Frank dropped his hands and continued to walk away.

“Well, I’ll be. Really?” Templeton cocked his head at Jeanie, rubbing his chin while the creases in at the corners of his eyes winked. “The Moore sisters will be crazed when they hear that. They’re always hovering over your articles, making me bring copies back from Yankton every time I go. Oh, they’ll eat this up.”

“It’s nothing.” Jeanie stared at the ground then at her feet. She despised Frank’s actions. That with his unconcern for her feet he demonstrated that he was as miserable as her husband as she was his wife. The difference being that she never embarrassed him in front of others. She took their vows to heart, even if the very uttering of them twelve years before had created the very noose that now sat poised around her neck.

Jeanie straightened. She wouldn’t share an intimate moment of shocked reality with another man.

Templeton looked from Jeanie’s feet to Frank who was headed toward the wagon. She shifted her weight. He was enough a gentlemen not to make eye contact or to comment on what he’d seen. Frank had never been a simple man to understand and he was even more complicated to explain to others.

“What exactly is the Quintessential Housewife? I’ve never read anything, I’m sorry to say, just brought the articles for the ladies over yonder,” Templeton said.

Jeanie bit the inside of her cheek. Frank’s mocking tone didn’t get past Templeton. “It’s well, a series of books and home-keeping columns I wrote in Des Moines. I was…well, no matter. I’m done with that now.”

She covered her mouth and fought back the embarrassment she felt even though Templeton had no idea the depth of it. Damn Frank for bringing that up. She did not want to explore their past.

“Frank!” Templeton shouted over the wind. “It’ll be dark soon. You’ll all have to stay for dinner and sleep. I caught three jackrab-bits just this morning.”

Frank trudged back toward them.

Templeton stretched and yawned. “Why don’t Frank, the boys and I head to the well and you ladies strike up a meal? Everything you might need is in the house, in plain site.”

“Well, no—”

“She’d be obliged to cook up some dinner.” Frank talked over Jeanie. “There’s not a homemaker alive who can stand in
her
kitchen. And she’s got the books to prove it.” Frank stalked away.

“My feet…Frank?” Jeanie said.

Templeton started to walk away with Frank then turned back, pulling Frank’s arm as he did. “Your wife’s feet, Frank…” Frank pulled his arm out of Templeton’s grasp and lumbered on.

“Uh, well, Jeanie, Mrs. Arthur, I mean…” Templeton tossed his head in the direction of the slender, whitewashed house. “You don’t have shoes? Mrs. Henderson—from the homestead you’re jumping—she left a pair behind. At least I think they’re hers. Check under my bedstead…they’re somewhere in there.”

Templeton lifted his hand to Frank as if to call him back, but Frank was shrinking in the distance, not listening or caring that Jeanie had bleeding feet and no shoes.

“Oh, and Mrs. Arthur,” Templeton said for the first time not making eye contact.

“I’m much obliged to sample your cooking as Frank said I’d be in for dandy-good eatings. That’s a real treat, that is. I appreciate it.” And he followed Frank’s path to the well.

Jeanie’s lips quivered. She couldn’t swallow. How could she confess to Templeton that yes, she could run a home, but that home was typically outfitted with a staff of six and a kitchen the size of his entire house?

It wasn’t until right that moment that she realized she should admit that same fact to Frank. But, Frank’s mocking tone returned to Jeanie’s thoughts and it was instantly clear. Frank was well aware of her limitations and it looked as though he would enjoy seeing her run into them as they tried to make a home on the empty prairie land.

Well, she would show him. If he was so willing to enjoy her humiliation, she wouldn’t allow him the opportunity. Jeanie scrunched her face. “Dandy eatings. I’ll show you both dandy-good eatings. If it’s the last thing I do.”

Hands on hips, Jeanie climbed the two steps leading to Templeton’s worn porch. She kicked a stone across the boards, into a hole at the far end, and then bounced a little, testing its strength. Not too bad. If the Henderson homestead—the claim the Arthurs were jumping—was like this, Jeanie could make it livable. She imagined her family resting in the shade of the porch roof, rocking in chairs, the children playing jacks and checkers on the wood floor. Yes, this just might work for Jeanie.

Templeton’s house was one floor, about 14x20. He’d built it sideways so the length of it promised more than it delivered in size, but the faded indigo door burst against the white wash and green grasses with the same awe that a human being floating among the clouds would inspire.

Jeanie threw open the door, ready to tackle dinner in clean quarters as opposed to the outdoors as she’d cooked in the last few nights. Sunlight flooded through the doorway and lit up the dusty space. Jeanie stepped inside, her bare feet lifting dirt, leaving prints as she circled the room. Did Templeton ever clean?

A bedstead stood in the far corner, a cook-stove in the fireplace and a squatty square table served as a spot to take his meals. Three stacks of books stood near the bed and one towered under the only rectangle window. Jeanie couldn’t help but smile at what took up most of the space. In the middle of the rat-trap stood a grand piano.

She plunked a few keys then swiped her finger along the top of it, revealing a path of glossy black paint under the blanket of dust. The sound made her throw her head back with ironic laughter. This beautiful, enormous thing, here amidst dirty nothingness.

Her feet burned. The shoes. She got on all fours in front of Templeton’s bedstead and began pulling things out. Mismatched men’s shoes, hats, billiard balls, sheet music, a tin cup, and a Spode platter, crusted with either burnt beans or rancid meat. She finally dislodged a pair of boots from under the far corner of the bedstead. The shoes were a size too big, but given the state of her feet, she thought that might be better.

Clodhoppers. Ugly, wicked-looking things. Heavy scars creased the leather and curled the toes upward, telling Jeanie stories she didn’t want to hear. And though she didn’t know the details of the events, the shoes proclaimed that the woman who’d owned them before lived hard.

She slipped the shoes over her reddened feet and said a prayer to a God she wasn’t sure she knew, that her feet wouldn’t grow infected. She stood up and lifted her skirt, turning her foot side to side before letting her skirts drop over the ghastly sight. She begged herself not to allow self-pity a home inside her heart. If she went there, there’d be no way to get back. Yet, the dismay at her station. It was there.

Katherine came into the house with a bucket of water, forcing Jeanie away from the enticing self-pity.

“Don’t touch a thing, Katherine,” Jeanie said. They had work to do, cleaning things up before they set to the real work.

“It doesn’t seem as though there’s anything to make dirty or break, Mama.”