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Authors: Penelope Williamson
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inability to keep clean.
Her husband. She could see him riding through a line of cottonwoods in the distance, sitting tall and loose in the saddle on the dun-colored mare he had bought in Fort Benton. She felt a sweet warmth when she looked at him. He was such a flamboyant man, with his ready smile and big laugh. As if he'd been dipped in gold with his suntanned face and tawny hair, and his melodious voice.
"An infinity of grass, Clementine," he had said, with that shining look he got on his face whenever he talked of his dream: to build his Rocking R into a cattle ranch the likes of which the world had yet to see. "Montana is an infinity of grass, and it's all there practically free for the taking." When he talked about the RainDance country, about its wild beauty and the miles of open range, she would feel something like music humming in her blood.
An infinity of grass. She would never have believed it without seeing it for herself. This endless vista of riffling yellow and green, always being stirred by the wind and smelling of the sage. She lifted her gaze to the looming mountains, black and gray and peaked with snow. There was such a great vastness to this country. What Gus called elbow room for the heart. But all this land and sky—there was a raw emptiness to it that sometimes touched her soul with fear.
The rawhide whip snapped twice through the air, crackling like gunfire over the head of a mule lagging in harness, breaking her reverie. "Gee, Annabel!" the skinner bellowed. "Gee, you twice-damned daughter of a whoring bitch!"
Clementine had to struggle to hide another smile, although she thought she could almost feel her ears burning. The mule skinner was not at all genteel. Indeed, Nickel Annie was proud of her leather lungs and her salty mouth, which she liked to boast could cuss the hide off her mules slicker than any whip.
The skinner pulled a twist of tobacco out of her boot and tore off a hunk with her mulelike teeth. She worked her jaw awhile, then tongued home the chaw. Clementine tensed as a brown stream whizzed past her face to land on the wagon tongue with a splat. But for the first time that week she didn't flinch.
"You was sayin' yesterday," Annie began in a voice gentle enough to lull a baby to sleep, "that your daddy is preacher to some temple back in Boston?"
An old tumbleweed tore loose from a rock and bounced away, startling a sage chicken. The bird made a strange whirring noise as it took to the air, but Clementine's gaze did not follow its flight. She knew the skinner was setting her up like a wooden duck at a county fair, only to shoot something outrageous out of her mouth that would bring a blush to Clementine's cheeks.
"Tremont Temple, yes. Perhaps you've been there?" she said with a Beacon Hill parlor smile. She was determined to hold her own against the vexing woman.
The skinner's lips pulled back from her teeth in a tobacco-stained grin. "Well, Gus's daddy is a Bible banger, too, but you
probably already knew that. A circuit-ridin' preacher is Gus's daddy. Not like yourn, who does his sermonizing in a proper church. A temple, even.... Now, there's a funny thing I've noticed about preachers' sons over the years," she added as if the thought had just occurred to her. "They're either hell-bent boys or they're all lassoed up tight in their own righteousness like your Gus. No betwixes and no betweens."
Clementine watched the wagon ruts unwind before her like ribbons across the prairie. Gus hadn't told her that his father was a servant of God. Odd that they had this in common, yet he hadn't seen fit to mention it. "Mr. McQueen is a good man," she said aloud, then wished she hadn't, for it sounded too much as if she was trying to convince herself that Gus was nothing like her righteous father.
Annie let out a liquid chuckle. "Oh, a regular saint is your husband Gus. Just like 'a hell-bent boy' do sure enough describe your brother-in-law."
She cast a smirking look at Clementine's
Her husband. She could see him riding through a line of cottonwoods in the distance, sitting tall and loose in the saddle on the dun-colored mare he had bought in Fort Benton. She felt a sweet warmth when she looked at him. He was such a flamboyant man, with his ready smile and big laugh. As if he'd been dipped in gold with his suntanned face and tawny hair, and his melodious voice.
"An infinity of grass, Clementine," he had said, with that shining look he got on his face whenever he talked of his dream: to build his Rocking R into a cattle ranch the likes of which the world had yet to see. "Montana is an infinity of grass, and it's all there practically free for the taking." When he talked about the RainDance country, about its wild beauty and the miles of open range, she would feel something like music humming in her blood.
An infinity of grass. She would never have believed it without seeing it for herself. This endless vista of riffling yellow and green, always being stirred by the wind and smelling of the sage. She lifted her gaze to the looming mountains, black and gray and peaked with snow. There was such a great vastness to this country. What Gus called elbow room for the heart. But all this land and sky—there was a raw emptiness to it that sometimes touched her soul with fear.
The rawhide whip snapped twice through the air, crackling like gunfire over the head of a mule lagging in harness, breaking her reverie. "Gee, Annabel!" the skinner bellowed. "Gee, you twice-damned daughter of a whoring bitch!"
Clementine had to struggle to hide another smile, although she thought she could almost feel her ears burning. The mule skinner was not at all genteel. Indeed, Nickel Annie was proud of her leather lungs and her salty mouth, which she liked to boast could cuss the hide off her mules slicker than any whip.
The skinner pulled a twist of tobacco out of her boot and tore off a hunk with her mulelike teeth. She worked her jaw awhile, then tongued home the chaw. Clementine tensed as a brown stream whizzed past her face to land on the wagon tongue with a splat. But for the first time that week she didn't flinch.
"You was sayin' yesterday," Annie began in a voice gentle enough to lull a baby to sleep, "that your daddy is preacher to some temple back in Boston?"
An old tumbleweed tore loose from a rock and bounced away, startling a sage chicken. The bird made a strange whirring noise as it took to the air, but Clementine's gaze did not follow its flight. She knew the skinner was setting her up like a wooden duck at a county fair, only to shoot something outrageous out of her mouth that would bring a blush to Clementine's cheeks.
"Tremont Temple, yes. Perhaps you've been there?" she said with a Beacon Hill parlor smile. She was determined to hold her own against the vexing woman.
The skinner's lips pulled back from her teeth in a tobacco-stained grin. "Well, Gus's daddy is a Bible banger, too, but you
probably already knew that. A circuit-ridin' preacher is Gus's daddy. Not like yourn, who does his sermonizing in a proper church. A temple, even.... Now, there's a funny thing I've noticed about preachers' sons over the years," she added as if the thought had just occurred to her. "They're either hell-bent boys or they're all lassoed up tight in their own righteousness like your Gus. No betwixes and no betweens."
Clementine watched the wagon ruts unwind before her like ribbons across the prairie. Gus hadn't told her that his father was a servant of God. Odd that they had this in common, yet he hadn't seen fit to mention it. "Mr. McQueen is a good man," she said aloud, then wished she hadn't, for it sounded too much as if she was trying to convince herself that Gus was nothing like her righteous father.
Annie let out a liquid chuckle. "Oh, a regular saint is your husband Gus. Just like 'a hell-bent boy' do sure enough describe your brother-in-law."
She cast a smirking look at Clementine's
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