B00C74WTKQ EBOK (2 page)

The girls shared the tea with him. Passing the cup back and forth, taking small sips of the strong hot brew. He was out of pemmican—the girls had eaten all that was left—and was down to the battle rations. Adrian offered a piece of a ration bar to each girl, explaining as he offered, “This doesn’t taste good, but it has a lot of calories. It’s good fuel, if not good food.”

He grinned at Rita’s expression as she bit into the bar. Lila, seeing Rita’s frown, was better prepared and tried to hide her disgusted expression as she took a bite. Other than a tightening around her eyes, she did a good job of keeping her face deadpan.

When they arrived at the girls’ home a few hours later, Adrian knew he wouldn’t be leaving them there. The ramshackle, rundown mobile home wasn’t worth trying to repair. It had never been a very good place in its best days, and after three years of the girls trying to make it on their own, it was a disaster. The meager garden had been decimated by insects. What few leaves were left looked like lacework. The corn crop, a small field of maybe half an acre, was drought-stunted, and had been finished off by grasshoppers, just as they’d said. There was no chance of a crop.

Adrian checked out the root cellar. The kidnappers had destroyed everything they didn’t take, but there couldn’t have been much anyway. Even if it had been full, and the contents undamaged, the girls would have been out of food in three or four weeks. One way or another, their time on this homestead had been coming to a quick end.

Emerging from the root cellar, he asked Lila “Where’s the nearest family you think might take you in?”

She pointed to the south and said “Zachary’s, about an hour and a half.”

Adrian said, “Lead the way.”
Lord, I hope these Zachary’s are good people.

Chapter 2

A
drian led the horse carrying
the two girls to the edge of the trees. From there it was open ground to Zachary’s cabin. He walked into the open a few yards before stopping and calling out.

“Hello the house! Anyone home?” Then he waited, and watched the smoke drifting lazily from the cabin’s chimney.
They’re home alright, and suspicious of strangers. As they should be.

Adrian shouted again, and stood waiting. After another minute, a tall, thin man dressed in overalls and a tee-shirt, stepped out from behind the cabin. He was holding a lever-action rifle pointed towards Adrian. The rifle was in an extremely ready position, not quite shouldered, but not far from it, either. The man yelled back at Adrian “Come on in, but slowly, and keep your hands where I can see them.”

Adrian began moving again, slowly as he’d been told, keeping his left hand at shoulder height, holding the reins out in front of him with his right hand. When he’d closed the distance to only fifty feet between him and the man, the man said, in voice filled with suspicion, “Lila, is that you and Rita? What you girls doing with this here man, eh?”

“It’s alright Mr. Zachary, he helped us when we was kidnapped yesterday.” Lila replied.

“Kidnapped? Who took you girls? Who is this man? I don’t recognize him.” Mr. Zachary asked.

“Why this here is General Bear, all the way from the Colorado cannibal fight and just recently from killing those Louisiana raiders!” shouted Rita with obvious pleasure.

“General Bear?” Mr. Zachary asked. “Really?”

Adrian groaned inwardly, but answered. “Yes sir, I’m Adrian Hunter. I’m on my way to Corpus Christi, and came across these ladies yesterday in a bit of a situation. From the looks of their home they’d only starve if I left them there. I’m hoping to find someone to take them in; they said you’re the nearest decent neighbor, so I brought them to you.”

By this time, Mr. Zachary had closed the distance between them and was sticking his hand out for Adrian to shake, his rifle almost forgotten in the crook of his arm. “By golly, this is something. Wait ’till Ma sees who stopped by, she’ll be tickled pink—and you best be hungry, cause she’s going to feed you whether you like it or not.”

Rita said, “We’ll like it Mr. Zachary, we’ll like it a lot! Mrs. Zachary is a fine cook!”

“Well come on in the house and let me introduce you to my family. They’ll all be plumb thrilled at this.” Mr. Zachary turned and walked swiftly towards the cabin shouting “Ma! Guess who’s here!”

Adrian sopped up the last of the black-eyed pea juice with a corn dodger and happily ate it. He leaned back and said “Mrs. Zachary that was extremely good. Best eating I’ve had in weeks. Little Rita was dead right, you are a fine cook.”

Blushing with pleasure, Mrs. Zachary replied, “Well it wasn’t much really, but I’m proud you enjoyed it. We don’t get many visitors, and never seen one as famous as you. I’ll have bragging rights for years to come. Sure you don’t want some buttermilk pie?”

Adrian groaned. “I want some, yes ma’am, but there’s no room for it yet. Maybe I could take you up on that later?”

Adrian had learned that Mr. Zachary’s name was Roger, but Mrs. Zachary had been introduced as Ma, and that seemed to be the only name she went by. The three Zachary boys and the father all called her that. He had also quickly discovered that she ran the family—she would be the one to decide whether they took in the girls or not.

“Ma” Adrian said, “We need to do a bit of talking if you don’t mind.”

Lila spoke up “Rita, let’s go outside and play. The grownups want to talk without us listening.”

Ma added, “You boys go outside too, scat now!”

After the five children had left the table and gone outside, Ma said, “I know what you’re going to ask, and much as I hate it, the answer is no. I can’t take those girls in, and it’s not just food either. Take a look out that window. You see how my oldest boy is mooning over that girl? Hormones are flying fast and furious right now. Those young’uns are cauldrons of bubbling hormones at that age. Putting those girls under the same roof with these boys would be a natural disaster. They didn’t grow up together; they don’t have that natural aversion to each other they’d have if they had. No sir, I’m sorry as I can be to say no to you on this…but it can’t be.”

Adrian, looking out the window, could clearly see what Ma was saying was true. The oldest boy and Lila were obviously interested in each other, more than the two kids understood. Adrian opened his mouth to ask a question, but before he could utter a sound, Ma interrupted.

“There isn’t a family anywhere near here that I know of that could take them in. Either they can’t feed them, or they aren’t good people, or they have the same problem I have, boys of a certain age. I don’t know of a family I could send you to and have any hope of them taking the girls in, or that I would want to take those nice girls in. Not one.” She paused, then continued thoughtfully. “I’ve heard about a girl’s orphanage two or three days travel from here. I don’t know nothing about it, but it’s been mentioned a time or two by travelers. If you’re going to Corpus Christi it’s more or less on your way, isn’t it Pa?”

Roger said, “I’d guess three days south of here from what I’ve heard. That’ll take you off your southeast course some, but I don’t think you’d lose more than a day. Just head south from here and stop occasionally to ask where it’s at, and I expect you’ll find it easy enough.”

It took four days, Adrian walking while the girls rode the horse and Bear roamed around them as usual, for them to find their way to the orphanage. It was a large two story house, reminiscent of a smaller plantation mansion more than a normal residence.
Probably has dozens of rooms for the girls
. A woman in her late fifties opened to his knock. She wore a full length dress and reminded Adrian of a typical grandmother. “Yes?” She asked. “Can I help you?”

Adrian replied. “Yes ma’am, I sure hope so. I found these two girls in trouble about a week ago, and I’m looking for a good home for them. I hear that this is a girl’s orphanage? Is that true?”

Smiling brightly, the woman stuck her hand out to shake and said, “I’m Lacy, Lacy Calhoun. You and your girls come on inside and sit while we talk.”

The living room was large, dark, and formal. It had a coolness to it that spoke of never seeing sunlight, and indeed, the few windows were heavily curtained. Even though it was nearly noon, Lacy lit two lamps for light to talk by.

Lacy said, “We don’t call this place an orphanage, we call it a ‘home for young ladies.’ There have been so many of them that have been stranded from family and loved ones by these hard times. We—that’s my brother, Reggie, and myself—take in some girls, but they have to be healthy and able-bodied because they have to work quite hard in the fields to raise the food they eat. We have fourteen young ladies with us now, from ten to eighteen years old. They’re out in the vegetable patch with Reggie now, but they’ll all be coming in soon for lunch. You can join us if you’d like, and meet everyone.”

She looked directly at Adrian, her hands folded quietly on her lap, and continued.

“As to what I am sure is on your mind right now, yes I do have room for these two lovely girls, as long as they are as healthy as they look. It may seem cold, but we get by on what we can do for ourselves. Taking in someone who is sick or weak endangers all of us. But these girls look fine.”

When the girls came in Lacy introduced first Lila and Rita and then Adrian. She made a big deal out of Adrian being General Hunter. The girls all looked at him with a renewed interest. When almost everyone was seated at the large dining table, two of the older girls began serving the simple meal, consisting of stew with very little meat but lots of vegetables, and cornbread on the side.

Adrian looked the brother over thoroughly. He was a tall, thin, man, slightly older than his sister. He was informal and comfortable with the girls at the table. But his hands, Adrian noticed, weren’t calloused from work, and that began a buzzing in the back of his mind that something might not be completely right about this situation. With that forewarning he began to observe everything more carefully. His eagerness to rid himself of the responsibility of two young girls had, to this point, clouded his attentiveness to detail. Now, however, he was alert again.

He watched the resident girl’s faces closely without being obvious about it. As Lacy announced to the girls that they would be taking in these two new girls, Adrian saw traces of sorrow on more than one of their faces. The most interesting was the oldest girl, who was sitting in a position where neither Lacy or Reggie were watching her. She made a strange face at Adrian, widening and then moving here eyes from side to side as though to tell him something—certainly something she couldn’t say in front of either Lacy or Reggie.

Adrian couldn’t signal back without giving her away; instead he said “I’ll be getting on the road right after we eat. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate your kindness and generosity in taking in Lila and Rita. I’m sure they’ll be fine here.” He saw the oldest girl’s face fall as she obviously thought that either he didn’t understand her warning or didn’t care.

Adrian gave the two girls each a quick hug and kiss on the cheek. Rita shed a few tears and said in a trembling voice, “Will you come see us sometime?”

Adrian wanted to say yes, but Lacy was listening with extra intensity for Adrian’s answer and he didn’t want her to think he would be back this way.

“No little Rita, I don’t expect to be coming this way again. But when you get all grown up you can come visit me at Fort Brazos.” It was a hard thing to leave the girls thinking he wouldn’t be back. He would stick around a while, watching from out of sight, to see what was going on in this place. Maybe the oldest girl was warning him of something bad, or maybe she wasn’t right in the head. He’d wait and watch, and see for himself.

Chapter 3

A
drian rode his horse for
over a mile before he began to circle back.

He came up behind the house, staying in the woods and out of sight. The vegetable plot lay between him and the house, and all of the girls, including Lila and Rita, were out pulling weeds and killing insects. Adrian wasn’t concerned that the girls would have to work, that would be the case wherever they went. He was concerned because of the lack of calluses on Reggie’s hands and the expressions he thought he’d seen on the other girls’ faces.

Something wasn’t right. Maybe they beat the girls. Whatever it was, he wasn’t leaving Lila and Rita until he was sure they would be safe.

As he watched, Reggie sat on an upturned bucket in the shade, leaning his back against a tree. He wasn’t working a bit, and in Adrian’s now suspicious mind he appeared to be more of a guard than a protector, as though there was a risk of one or more of the girls running away
. Still, I don’t have anything stronger than a hunch. I need to wait for something real before deciding anything.

Adrian settled in comfortably and watched for the rest of the afternoon. There was a bucket of water next to Reggie. Occasionally one of the girls would raise her hand and ask permission to drink, waiting for Reggie to nod before walking over and getting a dipper of water. On two occasions, a girl would raise her hand with two fingers extended, obviously signaling a need for a sanitary break. Reggie would nod and the girl would walk to the out-house between the food plot and the main house.