24

So it’s going to snow again.” Cassie watched out the window as Ransom and Arnett drove their wagon out the lane to build more furniture. She could hear the horses slopping through the mud clear into the kitchen. No wonder Mavis had said she couldn’t canter a horse in a corral, not with all this muck. “Mavis, it’s the first of April!”

“Oh, it’ll snow at least two or three times yet,” Mavis added cheerily, “but spring snow never lasts long. It melts off quickly.” She paused. “Well, rarely lasts more than a few days. You never can be sure about South Dakota weather.”

Making still more puddles and mud. But Cassie didn’t say that out loud.

In the near pasture, the longhorns and buffalo grazed as casually as if there had never been wolves last night. And there was the first buffalo baby of the season, a light-brown girl. She stood spraddle-legged near her mother, staring off into space. Wind Dancer didn’t seem too upset either, as if wolves were just another part of his new pasture experiences. It occurred to Cassie that when he and she lived with the show, he never grazed out on pastures. Grazing itself was a new experience to him.

She turned away from the window and finished clearing the breakfast table. Her mind stayed troubled, and it wasn’t just wolves. Micah had taken the wolf carcasses up to the cabin so that Runs Like a Deer could skin them and tan the pelts. She already had a stack of coyote hides with the fur on that she was sewing together into a wonderful blanket. Cassie caught herself wishing for the finished quilt to put on her bed. The softness of the fur always amazed her.

Mavis was examining a basket of apples beside the stove. “We’ll make these into applesauce today. They’re starting to go.” Apparently realizing she was teacher as well as matriarch, she held up an apple in each hand. “See? They’re getting a little soft, and two of them have brown spots. They’ll rot pretty quickly if we don’t use them before they make all the apples around them rot too.”

Cassie had made applesauce with Mavis before. “So first we quarter them and cook them.”

“You are so right.” Mavis pulled the big pot to the front of the stovetop so that it would heat more quickly. Cassie dipped water from the reservoir to make it about a third full. Together they cut the apples in half and the halves into quarters, cored them, and tossed them into the pot. It was pretty much mindless work, except when they had to pause to cut away a brown spot or flick out a worm.

Presently Mavis said, “I know you pretty well now. You’re usually not silent like this. What’s wrong?”

Cassie forced a smile. “I’m working on it. What will we do while the apples cook?”

“Start the early seed for the garden. We can plant peas outside directly, as soon as the ground thaws, along with lettuce and spinach; they don’t seem to mind snow. But the cabbage and tomatoes and a few others can do with a head start inside.” She smiled too, and it wasn’t forced. “I know you’ve been looking forward to planting a garden. This is the first step.”

“At the show kitchen, I think a lot of the vegetables came in cans.”

“I have always loved the fresh vegetables from my garden, and I think you’ll enjoy gardening too. First, we have to make the dirt.”

Cassie’s mouth dropped open. Make dirt. She thought of all the vegetable gardens she’d seen as trains passed through farmland, and Mavis’s own garden here. Make dirt?

While the apples simmered merrily at the back of the stove, the two women put on coats and slipped and skidded their way to the barn. “Bring this bag, if you will, please.” Mavis pointed to a large burlap sack of . . . Cassie peeked inside. Dirt. She picked it up and carried it back to the house. Mavis followed with another burlap bag.

“We’ll do this part outside.” Mavis donned leather gloves, handed a pair to Cassie, and opened her bag. It was dried cow flops. Cassie could feel her jaw drop. But as Mavis began crumbling them, Cassie gritted her teeth and joined in. If she hadn’t known where these came from, she’d not have been squeamish at all. They didn’t smell bad, they were so dry. Mavis dipped into the barrel of wood ashes for a scoopful. She poured the burlap bag of dirt into the wheelbarrow, dumped the crumbled manure on top, and tossed on the ashes. “Now we mix it up very thoroughly.”

Mavis was right about this being rather fun, but it did nothing to ease Cassie’s thoughts as she pushed the shovel into the dry pile and turned it over again and again. She’d read a passage in the Bible just that morning about taking every thought captive unto Jesus Christ. How come the Bible would say to do something but not give detailed instructions so one could actually do it? She could no more stop her rampaging thoughts than she’d been able to frighten the wolves away by shouting. Thinking about what could have happened still made her choke up. She jerked herself back to the moment and making dirt.

“We’ll keep this out and bag the rest for later.” Mavis shoveled their mixed-up soil into a burlap bag as Cassie held it open. She carried in the big bucket of dirt that was made from dirt and set it beside the stove, having no idea where Mavis would want it next.

Mavis began mixing water into her dirt a little at a time. “It should be moist but not muddy.”

Cassie sat down and watched. “Mavis, I’ve been thinking.” How should she say this? “Since no one is living in Arnett’s house, I thought maybe I could move over there. Gretchen could have her room back, and Arnett would feel better about the house. He says if no one lives there, it tends to deteriorate.”

“You might want to think about this a while. You don’t have to worry about the house. Apparently Chief is in there every day heating up dinner, and the furniture builders are in and out too. The house isn’t going to deteriorate. They’re keeping an eye on it.” She paused and stared at nothing a moment. “Have you ever lived alone before?”

“No.”

“I’m not sure you could handle that yet. I don’t think you realize how heavy loneliness can be.”

“I’d work Wind Dancer, of course, spend several hours a day putting our act back together. What with shooting practice, I’d have plenty to do.”

“Doing doesn’t ease loneliness. And it’s extremely unwise for a young woman to live alone out on a spread away from everyone and everything.”

“Why?”

Mavis licked her lips. “It just is, that’s all.”

Cassie narrowed her eyes. Memories of screaming and shooting and fire and searing pain made her catch her breath. “Surely—” She cut off her words. Her right arm tingled at the memory.

Mavis abandoned her dirt, pulled a chair around, and sat down right in front of her. Cassie felt trapped and didn’t know how to gracefully get away. “Now, Cassie, explain to me exactly what’s going on.”

Cassie’s heart went thud. Mavis knew things about Cassie that not even Cassie knew, when you started talking about relationships, and love, and all the things that tear people apart and put them back together. Mavis probably knew exactly what Cassie was thinking this very minute.

So she took a deep breath and blurted, “Ransom hates me. I want to be someplace where he doesn’t have to look at me all the time.”

“Why does he hate you?”

“Because it’s my fault that Lucas left, and he knows that. He’s hated me ever since I showed up. I can feel it. I’ve always felt it. He’s been miserable for months, and I don’t want to add to his misery.”

Mavis’s voice was soft, even. “Why does it bother you so much that he’s miserable? Do you care for him? I mean, of course, beyond simple friendship.”

Cassie shrugged. “I care about him, yes. I didn’t think I would, but I do.” Like she had for Lucas, like a brother. The snort started down about her ankle region, but she caught it before it became audible. Cassie Lockwood, while you have many faults, lying is not one of them. Like a brother? Ha! She forced herself to study Mavis’s lined and caring face.

“Well, dear Cassie, I’ve been watching you two, and I don’t think he hates you at all. There are other things preying on his mind right now.”

“Mavis, I know he does. And I want to put some space between us so he’s not so troubled.”

“Let me think about this a little. There is more here than it appears.” She got up and walked out back, returned with two large, deep trays. “I keep these just for starting seeds.” She smoothed her special dirt into a tray and began arranging seeds on top. “I’ll only start some of my seeds early, save the rest for planting outside directly later. We’ll cover these with more dirt and keep the trays warm and moist. When the seeds sprout, we’ll put them out during the day and bring them in at night.”

Now what should Cassie do? She helped with the trays, of course, but what should she do about these larger questions? She was certain that as wise as Mavis was, she had missed the obvious on this one. Ransom had made his feelings clearly known. Oh, he was polite to Cassie and all that, but she could feel the resentment, the dislike. Why could Mavis not see it? Because Ransom was her son, and mothers don’t see that in their sons. But what if Mavis was right?

The perfect answer came home with Gretchen that afternoon when she brought the mail.

“From Mr. Porter.” Cassie waved the letter she had just received and beamed. “Mavis, there’s a shoot in three weeks down in Louisville, Kentucky, organized by the man who won this last one and the one before, Ty Fuller. Mr. Porter says neither he nor Abigail can make it to this one, but perhaps you or Ransom could take me.” She looked up from the letter. “But you don’t have to. I’ve been there four or five times. I know my way around in Louisville. Frankfort too.”

“Go alone? That’s not wise, Cassie.”

“Ransom has far too much to do, and he’s finishing up his furniture. You have a lot too. I’m sorry to run off with so much work to be done, but I should be able to bring home some nice winnings.”

Mavis shook her head. “Bad idea.”

“I could go with her!” Gretchen suggested eagerly.

“Worse idea. Perhaps Elouisa Brandenburg can accompany you. But you shouldn’t be traveling alone.”

This was not the time to argue. “In any case, I will prepare for this one. It’s an excellent opportunity to earn some money.” And maybe, just maybe, Ransom won’t think quite so poorly of me if I start bringing in some income. Cassie folded the letter and put it in her drawer in the bedroom.

Mrs. Brandenburg was out of town assisting a sister who was ill. Mrs. Stevens could not possibly go. She was entertaining guests from Rapid City that week. Mrs. Hudson had the vapors and a peculiar cough, or she would love to accompany Cassie. Runs Like a Deer? Out of the question. She had never been in a city; she’d be more bother than help. Micah was fixing that broken fence.

Just over two weeks later, when Cassie boarded the train for Joplin, Missouri, where she would transfer to the Louisville train, she stepped from the platform to the car alone.

She stuffed her carpetbag into the overhead bin by herself. She laid her guns, her only companions, across the seat in front of her. Why did Mavis think this such a bad idea? Did the woman not forget that Cassie was an adult, for pity’s sake, responsible for a herd of livestock and her traveling companions who had accompanied her many miles when they were seeking the Engstroms’ place? She reveled in the new freedom of being on her own for the first time ever, responsible for no one but herself.

Mavis had given her a book to keep her occupied, but she enjoyed too much simply watching the countryside go by. Home, what it meant to people, what she saw passing by, occupied her thoughts a great deal.

And try as she might to dispel them, thoughts of Ransom intruded as well. There were all manner of young men about—that Christmas dance had confirmed that—and any of them would make a proper beau. She didn’t need a man who so thoroughly disliked her and blamed her for all his troubles.

Ransom.

She didn’t sleep well that night on the train, and in Joplin the next evening, she got off the Rapid City train and walked to the other platform. By the time she realized this was the wrong platform, the correct train had left. She took a room in a nearby hotel, an expense she hadn’t counted on.

Already she was a day late getting to Louisville, and she had not had a chance to practice at all during the long train ride. Early the next morning she boarded the train for Louisville, arriving late that afternoon. She walked to the Pride of Kentucky Hotel near the shoot venue, carrying her bags, rather than pay money for a hansom. On the way to her hotel, she passed a very nice little tea room and stopped for a very late lunch. They were within fifteen minutes of closing, but she was too hungry not to be seated. Lunch cost nearly twice what she had counted on.

She was more than ready to set her bags down by the time she entered the hotel lobby and stepped up to the desk. “Good afternoon. I am Cassie Lockwood. I sent in a reservation two weeks ago.”

The clerk, a rather snooty-looking fellow in a dark suit, scowled at her and leafed through a box of cards. “Lockwood?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I have no reservation here under that name.”

“Sir, I sent it in with my deposit. Then may I take a room anyway?”

“No vacancy. I am very sorry.” He didn’t look sorry at all.

“But—”

“I am sorry, young lady. There is a shooting contest near here this weekend, and all our rooms are taken.”

“Sir, I know about the shoot. I am one of the contestants.”

He looked at her as if she had just identified herself as the Queen of England. “Of course you are.” His tone of voice insisted she was lying. “That does not mean a room suddenly drops out of the sky. We are full, regardless. I’m sorry. You will have to look elsewhere.” He took a sideways step and addressed the man beside her. “May I help you, sir?”

His attitude ignited smoldering embers of anger. It was the shooting match that had filled up his hotel, and she was part of that shoot. “Excuse me, sir. Where is ‘elsewhere’? Where will I find other accommodations?”

“The nearest is the Hotel Kentucky. Several blocks in that direction.” He gestured vaguely toward the front doors.

And so she carried her bags another three blocks up Market Street. There it was. The sign looked dull, and the paint was peeling a little on the arched doorway of the Hotel Kentucky. In the small lobby there was no lovely furniture, and the clerk behind the desk was not dressed fancy. But he smiled. It was not a particularly friendly smile, more a cold smile, but at least it wasn’t a sneer.

“May I take a room here for the night, please?”

“Second or third floor?”

“Second, if possible.”

“They cost more.”

“Then third.” She must husband her money carefully, even if it meant carrying her bags up another flight of stairs. Her arm that was no longer sore was getting sore again.

She received her key and carried her bags up to room 27, stopping at each landing to rest for a moment. Once inside, she locked the door—Ransom’s instructions—and shook out her good skirt and fancy shirt so the wrinkles would fall out—Mavis’s instructions. She flopped down on her bed, weary in body and mind. She awoke with a start; it was dark outside! She was hungry, but she should not go out on the streets after dark—everybody’s instructions, even Micah’s. What to do?

She walked downstairs, but this hotel had no restaurant, nor was there one on this block, the clerk informed her. She walked back upstairs. To the third floor. She made certain her guns were clean and ready to go, her ammunition sorted and boxed correctly. She was ready.

Except that she’d had no practice.

Just before she curled up in bed, she took the unnecessary precaution of tipping her plain wooden chair and wedging its back up under the doorknob. Ransom had insisted on it, and she said she would, so she would. Her word was good.

She was so weary and restless, she had trouble getting to sleep. Sometime in the night, her door rattled. She raised her head.

It rattled again, as if someone were trying the doorknob. Now the chair wedged against it rattled. Someone was trying to come in! She should call out, but she was too terrified to emit more than a squeak. Who would try to enter her room? Perhaps a drunkard on the wrong floor, thinking this was his room. A mistake, surely, but frightening. The person tried once more; the chair rattled . . . and then silence.

What if it was a thief? Or . . . ? Quietly, she got up and opened her gun bag, pulled her shotgun out, and without making any more noise than necessary, carefully loaded it. Then she sat at the foot of her bed and waited, scarcely breathing. And waited. Whoever it was did not try again. He must have realized his error. Despite the reassuring silence, she could not get back to sleep. She was too nervous, her eyes too open to close again.

The next morning, she dressed in her show clothes, packed everything else up, and left that hotel as soon as the streets were light. She now had three blocks further to go to reach her venue, for the second hotel lay in the wrong direction. Now she was passing the Pride of Kentucky Hotel, and their restaurant was almost open; beyond its plate glass doors, she could see the waiters setting up the tables. She plopped her bags down near the interior double doors and sat down in an elegant chair to wait for them to open. She felt herself drifting off, too tired to stay awake.

“Why, here she is!” A man’s far-too-cheerful voice woke her instantly. “Miss Lockwood, my lovely nemesis! And all ready to compete.” Tyrone Fuller came sweeping up to her. “Did you sleep well?”

Cassie stood up, partly to wake up a little better. She felt foggy. Should she tell him? He had organized this; perhaps she should. “Not well, no. This hotel was full, and I had to go three blocks to a Hotel Kentucky. It was not a restful night.”

“Full? What? Why, I set aside a whole block of rooms just for participants. There was one waiting for you.”

“The gentleman at the desk insisted otherwise.”

“Come with me a moment, please. You may leave your grips there.” He waved toward a nearby bellhop. “Watch her bags!” He marched energetically to the desk. “Mr. Howe!”

The desk clerk looked at him, looked at Cassie, looked at him, looked at the gentleman he was waiting upon. “Excuse me a moment, I beg of you.” Mr. Howe was frowning as he moved to their end of the desk. “Yes, Mr. Fuller?”

“I understand you refused this young lady a room.”

“We were fully occupied, sir.”

“I had a room waiting for her in that block!”

“The block of rooms for the shooting contest were not assigned to specific persons in my records here.”

“You knew they were for the participants. Did she not say she was participating?” Mr. Fuller’s voice was rising, and Cassie did not like the attention they were drawing. She loved being center stage in a show. She hated this conflict.

The man cleared his throat nervously. “She did, ah, mention it, sir.”

“And . . . ?”

“I did not take her claim seriously, Mr. Fuller. She’s a little girl.”

Cassie glanced about briefly and wished she could shrink away, but there was nowhere to shrink to. They now had the attention of everyone in the room.

A third fellow joined them, introducing himself as the manager. Why couldn’t Mr. Fuller move his complaint to the manager’s office or wherever one would complain in private? He was explaining that she was a star, very famous, and to refuse her a room was criminal, but to top it off, “to send her to the Hotel Kentucky? The Hotel Kentucky! That nest of thieves and rounders!”

Cassie was mortified, absolutely mortified.

“Send a young girl amongst cads and pickpockets! What if—”

The manager snapped his fingers. Instantly Mr. Howe handed him a white pad and pen.

The manager looked at Cassie. “Miss Lockwood, on behalf of this hotel, I profusely apologize. My man made an innocent mistake, and I am extremely grateful nothing serious resulted. That does not negate the fact that it was a serious error. The dining room is now open.” He jotted something on the pad. “You and Mr. Fuller will please accept a complimentary breakfast, anything you wish. Mr. Fuller, rest assured the cost of the unused nights of that room will be fully refunded.” He jotted another note and thrust it at Mr. Howe.

Mr. Fuller fumed some more about incompetence, but the storm had apparently passed. He escorted her to the dining room. Her bags. Where were her bags? She saw them over beside the bellhop. The manager was speaking to him. And now the bellhop was taking her carpetbag away, leaving the gun bag. She so hoped peace was restored. But where was he taking her bag?

They were seated by a window. Cassie looked out on Market Street, where she had trudged down and up again. She secretly hoped Mr. Fuller would be riding to the venue, and she could ride too.

Free breakfast. Perhaps her luck was turning for the better. But she was so churned up by the argument out there—not just her stomach but her head and heart and mind—that she could not eat. She ordered ham and eggs and forced a little something down—the ham slice was greasy and quite thin, not slab size like Mavis’s. She knew she would be ravenous long before dinner, but she simply could not eat it all. Mr. Fuller plied her with questions the whole while and commented on how dainty and ladylike her appetite was, but her mind couldn’t give him her full attention. This day was already terrible, and it had hardly started!

One little wish came true. Mr. Fuller ordered up a hansom, and Cassie and her gun bag both rode in style. They arrived in ample time to set up.

She was convinced that bringing Micah along next time would surely be worth the cost of a train ticket and hotel room. With Micah handling the guns, she would only need to hold her hand out and the correct gun would be plopped into it. Without Micah, after each set she had to go to her table, choose her next gun, reload if necessary, and return to her station. And now it was time.

When the contestants were introduced and Cassie stepped forward, raising an arm high in greeting to the audience, a curious thing happened. The churning feeling disappeared under an onslaught of that old familiar tingle. This was her world, what she had been born to literally, and she wished that Mr. Howe, the hotel clerk, were watching now, seeing how wrong he had been. She was about to give these folks a good show. It was what she knew how to do, and she was among the best of the best. She returned to her table, picked up her rifle, and stepped out to the line.

In the first set—stationary targets—most of the contestants scored well. Cassie and Mr. Fuller were the only two with perfect scores. Next were moving targets with handguns. Cassie could not find her rhythm and missed two. But Mr. Fuller missed one, so it was not a disaster. Not yet. They were still one and two. By the time they had broken for dinner, four participants had dropped out.

The meal for the contestants was set up in a little tent apart from the concessions serving the audience. Trays of sandwich ingredients were set out, and a young woman ladled soup for each person. Cassie built a roast beef sandwich with triple meat and as many pickles and onions as she could pile on. She tasted the horseradish. Very mild. She had to slather it on to get the full effect. Mr. Fuller sat near her and commented that the daintiness of her appetite had fled.

Mavis said that she made her horseradish every fall. Salt and grated root with a bit of alum to retard spoilage. Her horseradish made Cassie’s eyes burn and her nose run. Lucas and Ransom ate it by the spoonful and didn’t seem to notice its acrid pungency. The Engstroms. She wished she were there now, but she relished this competition too.

That afternoon her arm held up long enough to shoot two overhead sets, clay birds and, as night approached, some kind of sparkling fireworks balls. The balls screamed and left a smoke trail. If you hit them squarely, they exploded in a spray of sparks. Cassie loved that set! But she had missed three of the clay birds. She was now fourth, with Mr. Fuller in the lead.

She rode back to the hotel with him in his hansom. “Don’t fret, Cassie,” he assured her. “I missed a few too. You’re not out of the running by any means, and tomorrow will go better for you. Not as good as my tomorrow, I hope, but better than today.” And he chuckled.

As she walked into the lobby, two people near the fireplace looked her way, smiled, and pointed. They must have been in the audience. She smiled back. The manager was standing by the desk. He smiled at her also. “Good evening, Miss Lockwood. I hear you did well. Mr. Howe will personally escort you to your room. Sleep well.” Mr. Howe jogged around the end of his desk, took her gun bag from her hand, and led the way to a lovely private suite. She realized they were trying to make up for their mistake, but she was going to enjoy this. An elegant suite, all for her alone. Her luck was indeed turning for the better.

The next day, she missed one of the stationary targets but none of the moving ones, and Mr. Fuller missed two of those. By noon she was in third place and Mr. Fuller had dropped to second. The leader was a young man from a town nearby who claimed he’d learned to shoot as a market hunter supplying restaurants with squirrels. For the fourth set, they released live birds, and three of Cassie’s birds flew off to increase Louisville’s pigeon population. Mr. Fuller missed one. The squirrel hunter missed four. In the end, Mr. Fuller was first, the squirrel hunter second, and Cassie third.

She received her winnings in cash. Although the hotel room was supplied by the organizers, her money barely covered her expenses. Had this hotel been added to her costs, she would have lost money.

Arriving back at the Engstroms’ some days later, she had exactly seven cents in profit. She would have to do better in the future.

When she told her story, the whole story, that night by the fireplace after supper, Mavis had only one thing to say. “You will never again go to a contest by yourself.” Cassie nodded. But who would accompany her?