Authors: Ashley Elizabeth Ludwig
Chapter 13
The next morning’s “Reveille” came with a shock. RuthAnne found her fingers stiff, sore, chapped, and cracking beyond all recognition. At the foot of her bed, a jar of salve beckoned. A mysterious gift. She gratefully rubbed the viscous liquid over her skin, amazed at how her hands drank in the pungent ointment. When all was said and done, she could flex her fingers without much pain. Tucking the jar into her footlocker for future use, she said a silent prayer for her secret angel. Who had left it? Was it Dolly? Certainly not Mrs. Stevens. She couldn’t imagine anyone else finding his way into the busy laundresses’ quarters or the impropriety it could imply.
She found her pitcher and washbasin filled with fresh water and quickly washed her face. She dressed in a hand-me-down, loose-fitting dress, but she still opted for the light moccasin shoes over the ill-fitting button boots someone had thought to provide. Looking very much the part of disheveled washerwoman, RuthAnne followed the sounds of crying babies and shushing mothers out the door and into the bright August morning.
Her next few days were much of the same. The mountains of garments shrank with each sundown and grew with each sunrise. She and Dolly took to making a game of who could finish their workload first.
Abigail Stevens had a habit of searching for incriminating evidence of a soldier’s misdeeds among his dirty laundry and made a joke of carefully wrapping up the nosegays and hidden cards she found in their pockets.
“God has a special heart for fools and children.” Abigail wrapped up five spare aces she’d discovered hiding neatly in a certain private first class’ shirt pocket.
“You trying to help him face the truth and shame the devil?” Dolly asked sweetly. Abigail retorted with a comment that had RuthAnne studying a tear in the pocket of a pair of pants drying on her line.
Dolly rolled her eyes. “You’d think she’s being pious ’cept she’s probably extorting the poor fellow.”
While Dolly and Abigail exchanged heated words, RuthAnne excused herself and gathered up a basket of sewing notions. Finished with her day’s work, she set to mending and reattaching buttons or securing loose ones.
“You know, you could charge extra for that if you waited ’til your soldier asked for the mending. Darned waste of time to do it aforehand, if’n you ask me,” Abigail chided.
“Who’s to look after these boys, if not us? Aren’t they the ones seeing us safe from Indians?” RuthAnne said, head high.
“We’ll see.” Abigail’s eyes misted then hardened. RuthAnne ignored the obvious disapproval, her back to the women as she completed her mending in silence.
It didn’t take long for RuthAnne to fall into the rhythm of working again. An endless medley of plunge and scrub, rinse and wring, pin and starch, iron and mend. She relished each task, knowing that every day would bring her closer to getting back to Mara.
The days were long and hot, like a blast from an oven. The nights were longer still, sultry under a moonless sky. She thought back to carefree summers as a child in Alabama. Windows left open to catch the barest of breezes. She laughed to herself that the ladies thought Tucson humid. Even though it was a mite uncomfortable, nothing could compare with the buzzing, biting insects and steamy-hot dog days of Somerville, Alabama.
Thoughts zipped round her head like the lightning that danced and flickered in the far off clouds. She watched through the small window as the dark silhouette of the mountains ignited into view. The distant storms clung to the steep slopes like a lover, refusing to let go and bring blessed, cooling rain.
She turned over, her mind churning with images of Mara, of the man who had rescued them, of the one who had almost taken their lives. Sleep refused to find her, and she punched her pillow with a frustrated fist. Where could Bowen be? She hadn’t seen him since he had deposited her with the laundresses. She disliked the notion of waiting for his return but couldn’t help jumping whenever she saw a swiftly approaching officer. How he’d so quickly gotten under her skin!
As the dark, lonely hours ticked by, she prayed for Father Acuña and Mariposa; she knew in her heart they were doing everything for her sister. That Mara was healing. Still, she longed to see her sister with her own eyes. To kiss her hands and brush her hair and bring her out of this desert into their own promised land.
Her thoughts slipped to the man who had led them into such dire straits, and she had to pray for another strength altogether. El Tejano
,
his soulless eyes and featureless mask, his heart as black as the desert night. He took what wasn’t his without remorse and had no care for human life.
She could not find the words to pray for his soul, and even more so, she had to still her tongue before she prayed ill over him. This man, who had almost killed her dear sister; this mystery that threatened to consume her every thought. And all of it jumbled together with thoughts of the secretive soldier who had rescued them.
Each night, she saw Bowen’s face as she wrenched her mind from poisonous thoughts toward the thief.
Todo o nada
resounded in her brain. She prayed for relief and dreamed of the mysterious soldier who had rescued them from the darkness.
****
RuthAnne inhaled the scent of warm sunshine from the clothesline. It was her last load of the day, and she could imagine the face of the young soldier who had dropped off his laundry bag that morning; Corporal Perry Finch, with his shock of blonde hair and piercing brown eyes. Though she’d be surprised if he were twenty years old, his face was weathered and tanned. He was gaunt from poor eating. While over six feet tall, the extreme heat and hardtack had its way of wearing a young man down.
She imagined him with a mother who worried over him, sending him letters that he probably responded to immediately. She knew a boy like this needed someone to give him extra care. He was still out on patrol and more than likely wouldn’t be back until late afternoon.
While a bevy of laundresses headed to the mess tent, RuthAnne unclipped Corporal Finch’s army issue shirts and trousers and folded them in her basket. She had already noted his pants needed patching at the knee and had managed to squirrel away just the right hue of swatch to fix it. Trimming a few loose threads at the cuffs should spiff up his jacket, and he was sure to lose a button or two if she didn’t shore them up. Humming while she sat with her sewing kit and scissors in the shade of a cottonwood tree on the edge of the Row, she set to caring for this soldier.
She could hear the whispers as she pressed his trousers with the iron, heated on the wood stove. Who pressed clothes for an enlisted man? RuthAnne actually found herself anticipating Abigail’s disapproving frown with each patch sewn and button re-secured. Still, when the men picked up their sacks, RuthAnne met them each with a word of kindness. Someone had to love on these boys. If not the women who cared for their worldly needs, then who?
The mess bell was ringing again when she finished her work. She wrapped up Corporal Finch’s worn-out uniforms in brown paper, as if the clothing were brand new, as she had for each of the five soldiers she had minded that day.
When Corporal Finch appeared, she noted a new injury to his knee, the cloth torn and rimmed with dried blood. She estimated the next size of patch he was going to need as she handed him his parcel.
“Thank you, Missus Newcomb.” He spoke with a white-toothed grin.
“Now, Corporal,” RuthAnne scolded, “you need to be more careful when scaling those barbed wire fences. You make sure to see the post surgeon about your knee before it gets worse.”
“Post surgeon’s gone to California for the rest of the summer. It’ll heal.”
“Well, with a bad cut you could lose a leg. You go see Alex McDole at the stable. He tends wounds on the horses. He can give your knee a looking over, too.”
Properly chastised, the young man promised that he would and thanked her when she tucked the jar of healing salve in his hands along with his laundry.
Over the next few days, Dolly and Abigail both mentioned a gleam in the eye and a lighter step in RuthAnne’s soldiers. And they weren’t the only ones who noticed.
Bowen tried to shake his dark mood by heading to the post store. He needed supply rations before their next outing. Whit Baker sat behind the counter, grinning up a storm as the captain found his way back.
“So here’s the man I have to thank for bringing the sweetest single girl to the fort in years.” Baker seemed obviously pleased about something, but whatever he aimed at had gotten Bowen’s hackles raised even higher.
“Careful what you say when you’re speaking of a lady, Whit. It could land someone in a heap of trouble if it falls on the wrong ears.”
Whit’s smile faltered, but then he found his grin again and laughed. “And a fine lady she is, sir. Drives a hard bargain in the store, don’t you know. Had me giving her almost fifteen percent off supplies that were going to be used for her work! I haven’t had to haggle that much since I first sold something to Dolly Jewel.”
“Those two are becoming fast friends.”
The men eased onto stools on opposite sides of the counter. Whit poured tepid lemonade into Mason jar glasses. Bowen swallowed, refreshed from the heat of the afternoon.
“Hard not to be friends with Miss Jewel. She’s a pistol.” Whit ran a hand through his hair, shaking his head. Bowen set his glass down and leaned forward to clap a hand on his friend’s shoulder.
“And just when are you planning on telling her you’re in love with her?” Bowen grinned. It would be a good match once the both of them realized they were made for each other.
Whit looked up, dismayed. “Is it that obvious, then?”
“You mean to anyone but me, you, and the fence post? No. Your secret is safe.”
Whit breathed a sigh of relief before going back to unboxing merchandise from a crate marked
Perishable
.
He pried open a tin of butter, sighing in annoyance. “Now, for what I have to pay, you expect it to at least be butter-colored. This looks like the desert sky at sunset! I can’t sell this. Well, not to the officers’ wives, anyway.”
Bowen eyed the open tin and the swirl of clear, red, orange, and blue oils inside it. He caught a whiff and wrinkled his nose as Whit replaced the lid.
“Oh, forgot to tell you. Wire came in this morning from Prescott,” Whit spoke over his shoulder while examining the rest of the newly delivered stock.
“Not to your attention, I’m guessing.”
“From the post commander, sent to Kendrick.” Bowen’s interest piqued, he leaned forward over the counter. Baker straightened before continuing. “Mrs. Carington, it seems, is returning posthaste. They’re on their way up from the Gila already by army ambulance. Might even be this afternoon. Kendrick was ordered to get the commander’s quarters ready for her and for two more.”
“Two more? The daughters are coming, then.” He hadn’t seen them since they were sent off to finishing school. If the girls were finished in any way like their mother, the entirety of Fort Lowell was in for a heap of trouble.
“Seems they’ve completed their studies at the finishing academy, and Mrs. Carington didn’t want to leave them unattended.”
“Kendrick’s going to have his hands full, then.” Bowen attempted to hide a smile. Anything that would keep the major from bothering the troops with trivial duties and meaningless inspections was fine with him.
“He’s been to the commander’s quarters three times already. He found Charley wandering through and has put him to work.” Whit leaned in closer, though they were alone in the store. “I hear tell that Charley hightailed it out already.”
Bowen chuckled at the thought. The sight of a nearly seven-foot Yavapai native with braids and a penchant for wearing an army coat over his costume of loin cloth would be quite a sight for two young girls fresh out of finishing school. Needless to say, knowing Charley’s attitude after spending a day with Major Kendrick, he might just disappear into the desert for a month.
At that moment, the door creaked open, and the heavy boots of Major Anthony Kendrick crossed the plank wood floor to the back of the store.
Bowen saluted with his hand though his eyes said otherwise.
“At ease, soldier,” Kendrick huffed. A slight man with a pointed nose like a rat and eyes that sat behind round spectacles, he was red in the face from the heat and full uniform. As Bowen stood up to leave, Kendrick put a hand up to stop him. “Wait just a minute, Shepherd. We need to talk.”
“Be seein’ you, Whit.” Bowen sighed and followed Kendrick out into the midday sun.
“What can I do for you, Anthony?” Bowen intentionally called the man by name rather than referring to him by rank. Smirking, he knew the offense could cost him. Still, it was worth it to see Kendrick puff up like a bantam rooster.
“You can start by respecting your superior officer.” Kendrick waited a beat before continuing. “I need you to help me find that new lady laundress you brought here. Seems she can’t do nothing but right by the men. It’s all I hear about, instead of the usual griping about how much we take out of their pay. They are asking for her by name. Rebecca? Luann? Whatever she calls herself. I need her.”
“Commander isn’t due back till the end of the week. She hasn’t been officially enlisted.”
Kendrick narrowed his eyes at Bowen’s tone. “We’re speeding things along in this case. Mrs. Carington and the twins are arriving on the morning stage. She’s going to get here before Marcus arrives, come hell or high water, and it may just come to that. They’ll need your lady friend as a handmaid for a few days...to get them sorted out.”
“I thought you assigned Charley that particular pleasure.” Bowen fought the urge to crack a smile at the weasel’s obvious discomfort.
“Charley? Well, that heathen’s disappeared back out into the hills. I don’t know why the army insists on hiring those savages anyway. You never do know if they are listening to you or just sizing up how to scalp you.”
Atta boy, Charley
, was all he could think as Kendrick rattled on with his gross generalizations about all native people. Bowen had known Charley for years. He was a proud man, an honorable man, and one that had not been broken by men like this one, Bowen was happy to see.