The Longest Road (50 page)

“What?” Crystal's face contorted. She slammed her cup down so hard that the china shattered and sent bits of porcelain flying while black coffee splashed and trickled to the floor. Crystal's green suit escaped. She ignored Laurie, who cleaned up the mess while Crystal ranted. “You're traipsing off to war without even asking me?”

“I told both you and Dub that I'd volunteer if we got into the mess.”

“What about Dub?” snapped Crystal. “Some partner you are! He gives you a chance to amount to something and you—”

Redwine closed his hand over hers. Strange how that dark hair on the backs of his hands and fingers never seemed to bleach. “Take it easy, Crys. I know how Johnny feels.”

She stared at him, jaw dropping. Johnny stared, too, but his dogged expression turned to relief. “Dub, you can't guess how glad I am to hear you say that.”

“Maybe I can, son.” Apart from threads of white in his straw-colored hair and widening jowls, Redwine didn't look any older to Laurie than when she'd first met him over six years ago, but she supposed he had reached his early fifties. A wistful grin showed his large square teeth. “If I was ten years younger and forty pounds skinnier, I'd try to sign up myself.”

“Shucks, Dub,” said Johnny awkwardly, “We've got to have oil to fight this war.”

“That's what
I'm
telling
you
!” shrilled Crystal.

“Lay off, Crys,” chided Redwine. He tightened his grip on her. “Johnny has to do what he thinks is right. I'm proud of him for that. So will you be when you calm down.”

“Dub,” said Johnny, “I can't tell you how much this means—your understanding and all. I'll make it up to you some way. Now if there's something we need to do about the partnership—”

“Don't worry about a thing.” Redwine leaned across the table and settled his free hand on Johnny's shoulder. “I'll take care of things, son.” There was a catch in his voice. “Least I can do. Crys won't lack for anything I can buy, beg, borrow, or steal.”

Going for their food, Laurie missed the next part of the conversation. When she returned, Johnny was saying, “Jim Halsell can mix that soup just as well as I can but he can't shoot wells by himself. To keep him in a job, I'm lookin' for a partway retired driller who'd dig some holes with my old spudder on a couple of farms I've bought cheap. If I can't find a driller, though, Dub, I'll count on you to give Jim work he can do.”

“Like I told you, son,” said Redwine benignly, “don't worry about a thing.”

On December 11, Germany and Italy declared war on the United States. The big white light that blazed over the White House driveway was turned off and the nation wondered when it would go on again—when lights all over the darkened world would shine—and what they would illuminate. It would not be the same world, never, ever again.

Johnny's train left in the afternoon before Laurie went back to work at the restaurant. At first she resolved not to see him off, stand on the platform with Redwine and Crystal as he disappeared, but as the time drew near, she had to seize that last glimpse of him.

After adding cumin, cilantro, and chilies to the beans stewing for Way, Everett, and Buddy—she and Marilys got their meals at the hotel—Laurie washed her hands and took off her apron. “I'm going down to the depot.”

Marilys shot her a quick glance of sympathy. “Shall I go with you, dear?”

Laurie shook her head and forced a grin. “I'll probably lurk out of sight while Johnny kisses Crystal good-bye and then I'll go to the rest room and howl till I'm fit to come to work.”

“If you want to take off tonight—”

“I'll do better working.”

On the off chance that Johnny might see her while she stole her last look at him, Laurie brushed her hair till the waving mass of golden brown clung to her wrist and fingers. She tied it back with a velvet ribbon the tawny green of her eyes. Her hooded green cape covered her brown plaid pleated skirt and beige sweater. She had tried in vain to think of something to give Johnny, something small and special that would be a kind of charm to keep him safe. As she put down her brush, her eyes fell on her mother's little white New Testament. Afraid of wearing it out, she had bought another several years ago for the family's Sunday worship.

Apart from Johnny's harmonica, the Testament was her greatest treasure. Her mother's eyes had read every word, her fingers turned each page. Laurie picked up the small book, opened it. The purple satin bookmark and thin pages still gave out the faintest scent of lilacs. Again, Laurie smelled carefully folded flour-sack sheets and embroidered pillowcases redolent of handmade lilac sachets tucked among them. She had taken the sheets off her mother's bed that last sad time after Rachel Field's body was given, over to the undertaker and the coffin.

Mama's Bible is buried with Daddy, Laurie thought. I can't give away her Testament. But if there were a power of love that lived beyond the body, if sometimes through some special grace the beloved dead could help the living—Laurie pressed the book to her heart. She had always felt that Mama sent them Johnny on that terrible day they left their home, their town, the world they had known, the selves they had been, that grave out on the dust-choked prairie. When, helpless in Matt Sherrod's hands, she had called on her father, she believed that he had heard, that in some incomprehensible way, he had intervened.

Mother, forgive me for not keeping this. You must know it's because your Testament means so much to me that I'm giving it to Johnny, that I ask you to help him if you can in the way you'd help me
.

Laurie kissed the Testament, wiped her tears from the faded gilt lettering. She put it in an envelope that she could slip into Johnny's pocket if there was no moment to speak to him privately. On the envelope, she scrawled, “This is my mother's. It's to keep you safe, Johnny, and bring you back.” On impulse, she slipped the harmonica into her cape and hurried down the stairs. Now that she had a talisman for Johnny, it would be awful to miss him.

A storm had howled through yesterday, leaving clear, frigid air that gave the lie to the brilliance of the sun. Laurie wished she'd worn slacks, which had become more common since women had started working in defense factories several years ago. Pulling the hood forward to protect her face as much as possible, she came in sight of the depot and the long train that would carry Johnny off.

He came out of the building with a duffel bag. No one was with him. Laurie gasped and then concluded that Crystal, who detested cold, was waiting inside till it would be time to wave final good-byes. But where was Redwine? Jim Halsell limped in sight then from the other direction. He shook Johnny's hand. They were talking softly and didn't notice Laurie till she stopped beside them.

“… so if you run short of money before you make a well, just ask Dub,” Johnny was saying. His gaze followed Jim's to Laurie and he caught both her hands, warming them in his. “Come to see me off, honey?”

Time and the southwest wind and sun had grooved lines deeper at his mouth and eyes but his face would always be to her the most handsome in the world. He answered the question she couldn't ask. “Crystal has a bad cold so I made her stay home. Dub hates good-byes. We had a steak dinner and good bourbon last night before he left to make some big deal in Fort Worth.”

Even in the cold wind, Johnny's hands warmed Laurie to her sad heart. His smile, the glow in his gray eyes, melted the chill that made her bones feel like ice that would splinter if she moved. “Give me a kiss, Laurie, and I'll hop on the train. No use in you and Jim standing out here freezing.”

“I have something for you.” Laurie hated to slip her hand from his in order to get the envelope from her pocket. “Please keep it with you. It was my mother's—”

“Aw, Laurie! You can't give that away!”

“It's just a loan, John Morrigan!” she scolded. “I want it back when you come home.”
And if you don't come back, nothing will matter
. She thrust the little parcel into the pocket of his jacket, found a harmonica there. “Johnny! I brought the one you gave me! Let's play together.”

“Sure. Let's do.”

Turning their backs to the rising wind, they seemed to read each other's minds, one scarcely starting a tune when the other joined in. People catching the train or simply attracted by the music gathered around them as they rollicked through “Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition,” written about the chaplain who had done just that at Pearl Harbor.

People stomped and clapped and shouted the names of other songs they wanted, but the conductor was yelling for passengers to board. Laurie met Johnny's eyes, raised his gift to her lips, and started the song he had taught her on the day one world ended and another began: “So Long, It's Been Good to Know You.”

Finishing in a crescendo, Johnny thrust his harmonica deep in his pocket and took her in his arms. She'd stolen her only real kiss from him. This time she'd only take whatever he gave. She closed her eyes as his lips touched her cheek, was starting to move back when his arms tightened. His mouth claimed hers. Not in a butterfly-big-brother kiss, or a cruel one, either, but sweet and warm and loving, that of a good friend.

Laurie couldn't stop herself. She closed her hands behind his neck, lifted her mouth to meet his more fully, let her lips part, soften, invite. His kiss changed. Swept with fire, she felt as if he drank her in, made her part of him.

He broke away. For a second, his face was grim and startled. Then he laughed huskily and touched her cheek. “So long, Laurie. I'm not much at writing but I'll scribble you a postcard now and then.”

“Just let us know you're all right—” The tears she wanted to hold back till he was gone overflowed. She scrubbed at her face and tried to smile. “Sign your name on the card if that's all you can do.”

He shook hands with Jim and boarded the train, swinging his duffle up first. “Never expected to ride in a passenger car,” he shouted, grinning. He raised his hand in salute and vanished.

The seats by the windows were already filled. Laurie and Jim couldn't see him, but neither moved till the train belched and snorted, gave its lonesome wail, and started to chug along the track.

“Pretty tough that his wife wasn't here,” said Jim.

“She's sick.”

“Yeah.” Jim sounded unconvinced. “Come on, Laurie, you're shivering! I'll walk you home.”

“I'm going to work.”

“Then I'll walk you there.”

“Your leg—”

His young mouth twisted. “Looks worse than it is. You sounded good together on those harmonicas.”

She'd remember that almost as much as Johnny's kiss. Every time she played those songs, she'd hear him. “Johnny gave me music the day we met.” She spoke through the tears that scalded her throat. “He—he gave me a way to go on. And now he's done it again.”

“That's what your Dad did for us.”

She could cry then, accept Jim's shoulder, his comforting arms. The aching disbelief that Johnny was gone, heading into danger, was still there when she'd cried herself out, but it was some help to release her pent-up grief, to feel drained rather than explosive. She made good use of the clean bandanna Jim gave her, laughed shakily, and wiped the tears from his cheeks.

His eyes had never looked so blue. At a little over six feet, he had not fleshed out to match his frame but enduring his injury and convalescence had pared the last boyishness from his face. Jim, in fact, had never had much chance to be a boy. If she hadn't known Johnny—Well, someday there would be a girl who'd give Jim her whole heart. He'd always be Laurie's special almost-brother friend but she had to guard now against using him to assuage her grief.

“So men
do
cry,” she teased gently. “Are you going out to one of those farms of Johnny's and get started on a well?”

“No.”

She stared. “Whyever not? Didn't Johnny find you a driller?”

“Johnny was just making sure I had a job while he's gone. If I'm really his partner, I'm not going to draw wages while he runs all the risk.”

“What are you going to do?”

“You've heard of Soup MacNeal?”

“Sure.” MacNeal, a small, quick-moving, red-haired man with merry dark eyes, operated out of Enid but he had eaten in the restaurant several times when passing through. “He's the best well shooter in Oklahoma outside of Johnny.”

“I'm going to work for him. Mix the soup, drive the truck, help set the charges.”

“But—”

“Vance Morrow, the driller Johnny located, draws royalties from several wells. He's willing to make some shallow holes for an interest in any oil he hits, but at least one helper has to be paid, and operating expenses. Soup will pay me enough to hire a roughneck and pay some toward expenses on top of what I have to send Mom for Bernice.” His jaw hardened. “That way, I'll be a partner, not a mooch.”

“Oh, Jim! Why be so hardheaded?”

He shrugged. “Haven't I heard you sing a song that goes, ‘A man's a brother to a mule'?”

“Maybe you have.” She added with honest respect, “You must be really good with nitro, Jim, for someone like Soup MacNeal to want you.”

“I like it,” he said with a slow grin. “Not everybody does.”

How he could feel that way after his accident baffled Laurie but handling and controlling explosives must give him a justified sense of power. No one laughed at a well shooter even if he did limp. With a few more years' experience, Jim could fully partner Johnny in shooting wells, or start his own business. With pride honed fierce by his laming, Jim would probably do that.

“Come in for some coffee and pie?” she asked him at the door of the hotel.

“Thanks, but I've got to see Vance and make sure he's all set to go. I'm meeting Soup in El Reno tomorrow to shoot a well.”