A Three-Turtle Summer

by Janelle Meraz Hooper

1. A Sister in Trouble

Fort Sill, Oklahoma, July, 1949

         It was too hot to play cards, especially if someone were keeping score, and Grace’s sister, Vera, was.

   “Ay, carumba! You can’t stand to go two hours without beating someone at something, can you?” Grace Tyler playfully pouted.

         Vera ignored her little sister, and began shuffling cards as she gleefully announced in a loud voice so Grace could hear her, “Senoras, the game is canasta, and we’re going to play according to Hoyle.”

         Pauline, the middle sister, laughed and pointed at her mother, a notorious and frequent card-cheater.

         Everyone was hot, but in her long-sleeved shirt and long skirt, Grace was sweltering. Sweat beaded up on her forehead and neck and she kept stretching her legs out because the backs of her knees stuck to her skirt.

“Gracie, for God’s sake, go put some shorts on,” Vera said.

         Grace ignored her sister, pulled her shirt away from her perspiring chest and asked, “Anyone want more iced tea before Vera whips the pants off of us?”

            Momma and Pauline both nodded and Grace poured sweet tea over fresh ice cubes while Vera got a tablet and pencil out of her purse.

            The room was almost silent as each woman arranged her hand. Only Momma barely tapped her foot and softly sang a song from her childhood under her breath:

“The fair senorita with the rose in her hair …

worked in the cantina but she didn’t care …

played cards with the men and took all their loot … awh-ha!

went to the store and bought brand new boots … ”

         “Awh-Haaa!” Grace’s five-year-old daughter Glory joined in.

         Unconsciously, the other two women started to hum along while they looked at their hand. About the second “Awh-Haaa!” Vera abruptly stopped humming and looked at her sisters with a raised eyebrow. Something was fishy; Momma was much too happy. Barely containing their amusement, they watched as she cheerfully arranged her cards.

         Finally, unable to suppress her laughter any longer, Vera jumped up, snatched the cards out of her mother’s hands, and fanned them face-up across the table. “Ay, ay, ay!” She cried out, “Momma, tell me, how can you have a meld and eleven cards in your hand when we’ve just gotten started?” The fun escalated as Vera rushed around the table and ran her hands all around her mother and the chair she sat on to feel for extra cards.

         “Stand up!” Grace and her sisters said as they pulled their mother to her feet. They shook her blue calico dress and screamed with laughter as extra cards fell from every fold.

         “Glory,” Vera told her young niece, “crawl under the table and get those cards for your Auntie Vera, okay?” Grace moved her feet to the side so that Glory could crawl around on the floor. Her childish giggles danced around the women’s feet as she scrambled for the extra cards that dropped from her grandmother’s dress.

         “Momma,” Vera laughed, “you’re a born cheater. How did you know we were going to play cards today?” she asked.

         “I played with Lilia yesterday. The cards were still in my purse. Besides, I’m not the only one in this family who’s been caught with a few too many cards,” Gregoria said in her defense.

         “Yes, but you’re the family matriarch. We expect better of you than we do our good-for-nothing brothers,” Pauline said.

         “Huh! Matriarch, my foot. You girls never listen to a word I say,” their mother grumbled.

         “Maybe that’s because we can’t trust you,” Vera said.

         As another card dropped from Gregoria’s dress and slid across the slick linoleum floor, Vera added, “We’ll strip you down to your rosary before we ever play cards with you again, Momma.”

         “Yeah,” Pauline, chimed in, “the next time you’ll play in nothing but your lace step-ins and a bra made from two tortillas.”

         “Well, at least I’ll be the coolest one at the table,” Momma chirped.

         Vera reached across the table to gather all the cards and reshuffle them. “We’re going to start all over, and we’ll watch you every minute.”

         Grace felt a sharp pain in her stomach when she looked up and saw her husband’s scowling face through the screen door. Why was he home so early? She didn’t have to look at him again to know his normally handsome, blond features smoldered with disgust.

                  Dwayne hated for Grace to have her family over. There would be trouble once they left, since the room was heavy with the smell of pinto beans and tortillas. It was bad enough when they visited; it irked Dwayne even more when her dark-skinned family stayed for meals.

               Earlier, in Dwayne’s high twangy voice, Grace had mimicked what he’d said the last time they’d been over for Sunday dinner. “Gawd almighty!” he’d ranted, “A Texan breakin’ biscuits with tacos! What will folks be thinkin’?” The women had laughed at Grace’s impression of Dwayne. The man himself seldom made them smile.

            The minute Grace’s family looked up and saw the sorry Texan, their laughter died, and they quickly packed up their cards, crochet cotton, magazines, and snacks that helped to pass the time on a hot afternoon. One by one, they lined up to leave through the backdoor.

         Grace said a quick goodbye to her mother and sisters and moved away from the narrow doorway as the women filed past Dwayne. She feared these close encounters as much as she would dynamite that was too close to a match.  All she could count on was that her mother would deliberately say something sweet to him  Always gracious, she wasn’t one to pick a fight.

         “Poor thing, you look absolutely beat,” Gregoria Ramirez said to Dwayne. The cranky man didn’t see her wink at Grace. “We’re going to get out of here so you can take a nap before dinner.”

         Grace’s mother’s words were kind and conciliatory, but Gregoria didn’t walk around Dwayne to rush out the door. Instead, she stood her ground and looked him straight in the eyes until she intimidated him into stepping out of her way.

         When Grace’s mother stepped onto the porch she leisurely adjusted the plastic tortoise shell combs that held her long, dark hair in a bun. Then she fished her heavy clip earrings that matched her outfit out of her dress pocket and put them back on her ears. Grace grinned when she saw her mother nonchalantly slip another extra card that was also in her pocket into her purse before she stepped onto the sidewalk.

         She held her breath as Pauline passed by the loathsome soldier. She never knew what her sisters might say, and Pauline could have the sharpest tongue of all. This time, however, all she did was caution, “Dwayne, this heat’s too much for you, it’s over a hundred today, you’d better take it easy.” The sound of her high heels click-click-clicked on the shiny kitchen floor and made Dwayne cringe.            Raised on a cattle ranch where his father’s booze bottles almost outnumbered the cattle, Dwayne didn’t know what to think of Pauline’s high-heeled shoes and frilly clothes. He just knew he didn’t like them. For her part, Pauline never considered making any changes to accommodate the manipulative soldier her sister had married.

         Dwayne clinched his jaw and refused to let himself look down at Pauline’s high heels as she passed him, but she knew that he knew that she wore them. Always playful, she did a quickstep on her way to the door.

         The ruffles on her short, colorful, full skirt moved to the music her heels made as she walked. Before she passed Dwayne, she adjusted the elastic around the top of her peasant style blouse to make sure her bosom wasn’t exposed. It was a subtle movement; only Grace noticed it.

         Pauline lingered in the doorway as she said goodbye to Grace, then glided out, onto the porch, and tossed her long, wavy, black hair. The movement jangled her large, golden earrings as she crossed the threshold. “Adios, Muchacho!” she called to Dwayne, as she gave him a backward wave. Grace’s eyes flew to Dwayne to see if he noticed that her middle finger stayed up longer than the others. He didn’t. He was already looking at Vera.

         “You look like hell,” Vera said as she passed a sweaty and wrinkled Dwayne, “and you could use a shower. Phew!” she added as she marched out the door. Grace saw her mother give Vera a sharp look when she stepped onto the porch, but her oldest daughter just shrugged her chubby shoulders, as if to say it was the best she could do. This cowboy had used up all of his good graces with her.

         Grace wasn’t surprised that Dwayne had remained quiet while her family left. She imagined that he had plenty to say; he just didn’t dare say it. Not with these women, who weren’t as meek as she was. She couldn’t tell which one he feared the most: the mother, quiet but cunning; Vera, outspoken, tough, and fearless; or Pauline, who could cut a man to ribbons with her tongue and flirt with him at the same time.

         As Vera reached the sidewalk at the bottom of the porch stairs, Pauline broke into a sprint ahead of her across the yard to Vera’s car and jumped into the backseat, still giggling. Pauline had given her first gringo salute when she held up her finger to Dwayne, and she was tickled with herself. Even her mother’s look of disapproval couldn’t dampen her glee.

         When Gregoria opened the car door on the passenger side to get into the front, Pauline buried her face between her legs in her ruffled skirt, to muffle her laughter. Vera opened the door on the driver’s side and stopped outside the car to light a Kool and let some of the hot air out before she got in. She waved a final goodbye to Grace just before she slid behind the wheel and started the old blue Cadillac.

         Grace’s heart ached when she saw Vera’s car move out of the parking lot. To avoid raising dust in the neighborhood, Vera drove so slowly that Grace thought about grabbing Glory and making a run for the car. But if she left now, it could make Dwayne mad enough to file custody papers for their daughter. She could leave her marriage anytime. The trick would be leaving with Glory.

         Grace was convinced that the courts often awarded custody of mixed blood children to white fathers because their perception was that the children would be more educated and better off economically. It was much like the theory that Indian children would be better off if they were forcefully separated from their Indian culture and raised away from home in white schools.

*

         Vera headed the old Cadillac for the highway and blew her cigarette smoke out the window as Gregoria halfheartedly said, “Vera, you must show respect to the men in the family, the way we did to Poppa.”

         “When he acts like Poppa did, I’ll show respect,” Vera answered. “Did you see how mad he was? He just can’t stand to see us have a good time. I’d like to see our baby sister dump that pain-in-the-ass sourpuss. He’ll never treat her right.”

         “Look where they’re living, on the far edge of the post, in old converted Army barracks. It’s worse than Dogpatch out there,” Pauline joined in.

         “Yeah, it breaks my heart to see Grace married to that awful slouch. Momma, how did Poppa ever allow that?” Vera asked her mother.

         “Ayyy, Vera, by the time Gracie met Dwayne, Poppa was already sick. He couldn’t stop Dwayne, and you girls were off with your new husbands,” Momma groaned. “Dwayne made your Poppa so miserable. Juan worked so hard to fit in here, and Dwayne did everything he could to make him feel like he didn’t belong. He always refused to believe your father had a college degree in engineering from the University of Mexico. He treated him like he was nothing but a cotton-picker. Your poppa only picked cotton during The  Depression, when he needed to put food on the table.” Momma dabbed at her eyes.

         The women listened intently, and nodded their heads in sympathy, as if they’d never heard the stories before.

         “Yeah, I remember that gun he used to carry for rattlesnakes in the fields,” Pauline jumped in. “Poppa was a perfect shot. BAM! Those snakes were dead as sticks.”

         “Pauline, you don’t really believe that?” Vera laughed as she looked at her sister in the rearview mirror. “Poppa couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn with that old gun. It was loaded with snake shot. He couldn’t miss because the pellets sprayed everywhere. That’s why he always told us to stand way back.”

         “Really?” Pauline asked. “I thought it was so we wouldn’t get snake blood all over us.”

         Just before they dropped Pauline off at her tiny garage apartment, Vera asked, “Sis, do you and Boyd want to come over and listen to my new records tonight? I’ve got all the new ones, even Nat King Cole.”

         “Naw, Boyd is off somewhere, he may not even get home for dinner,” her eyes avoided Vera’s, that stared suspiciously at her in the rear view mirror.

         “Come without him. Benny is going to show us how to samba. You can come as you are, no one else will be there. I want to learn a new dance before Rudolf takes me to the officers’ club Saturday night.” Pauline was obviously uneasy, but with Momma in the car, Vera couldn’t dig any deeper. Besides, if her sister were having trouble with Boyd, she’d handle it. Pauline was tough.

         Grace was the sister Vera was worried about. Her little sister was in over her head and too stubborn to admit it. Momma’s favorite, Grace had been kept so close to home that she’d never had any experience with men when she was growing up. At the time, Dwayne must have looked good to her naive sister. Anyone else with more savvy would have thrown him head first into a deep creek and never looked back.

         “Maybe. Will Grace come?” Pauline sulked, as she sank further into the backseat, her mind still on Grace’s cranky husband.

         “I asked her and she said she’d ask Dwayne,” Vera answered. “But you know Dwayne doesn’t like us or our music, and he has never been a dancer. He doesn’t even two-step to that country music he loves to torture us with.”

*

         Her mother and sisters gone, Grace braced herself for the latest tirade from Dwayne as she started dinner. She didn’t have to wait long. Dwayne stood behind Grace and ranted at her as she breaded perch with a combination of flour and cornmeal. When she moved back and forth from the countertop by the sink to the stove, he followed her so she wouldn’t miss a word.

         “The fish you caught look good, Dwayne,” Grace chatted as she tried to soften his anger. It was an honest compliment. Dwayne had a lot of faults, but he was one heck of a fisherman. The day before, he’d gone fishing on the way home from work and had caught a whole stringer full of perch before it started to get dark. They didn’t eat them that night because Grace already had dinner on the table when he got home. Dwayne was only briefly pleased at the compliment. Soon he was back to running down Grace’s family as she peeled potatoes to fry in one of her big wrought iron skillets.

         “Why the hell can’t you keep your family out of here?” Dwayne yelled as he jerked his fatigue hat off his head and threw it across the room. “What if I’d brought one of the officers from the battalion home? Do you think one of them would want to see a bunch of women sittin’ around playin’ cards and gibberin’ in Spanish the minute he walked through the door?”

         “I’m sorry, Dwayne, I never thought you’d be home so early.” Grace’s lower lip quivered, and her words tumbled out on top of each other like potatoes that rolled out of an overturned sack. “But we weren’t speaking Spanish, Dwayne, we weren’t!” Grace hustled around the kitchen to get Dwayne a goblet of iced tea.

          She desperately wanted to go to Vera’s. Not only would it be fun but it would also keep Dwayne away from her for the evening. She knew she didn’t dare ask to go until he was in a better mood.

         Grace held her breath as he looked around the kitchen and gave the air an arrogant sniff before he sipped his tea.

         “It’s a good thing you pepper-bellies just eat beans. Otherwise, I’d be in the poor house,” he sneered as he lit a Camel.

         Grace knew it wasn’t just the food. Dwayne even resented her mother and sisters when they brought the food with them. He never hid the fact that he felt her family wasn’t worth his time. Only Rudolf, Vera’s husband, who was an Army colonel, ever got more than a few grunts from him.

         “I’m sorry, Dwayne. It’s just that they were here all day, and we got so hungry, and Glory had to eat something. I just warmed up some leftover beans and Momma made a few tortillas. It was nothing fancy.”

         “It’s a dog-eat-dog world, Grace.” Dwayne lit another cigarette from what was left of the last one. “And we’re not rich. We’ve got to spend our time and money on the people who can do us some good.” Dwayne finished his iced tea and left the glass on the table. A puddle of condensation formed at its base and crept like a bleeding wound across the old table with the red, marbleized plastic top. The pattern of the moisture disturbed Grace and she hurried to wipe it up.

         Grace gave up. “Okay. Vera invited us over tonight. Everyone will be there. Benny’s going to show Vera how to samba, and I haven’t seen him for awhile. But, if you don’t want to go, I’ll call and say we’re staying home.”

         “We were invited to Vera’s? Is Rudolf going to be there?” When Grace nodded yes, she noticed his interest perked up. “Call them,” he urged, “tell them we’ll be over as soon as we eat. In this man’s Army, it could come in real handy to be on good terms with a colonel.”

         On his way down the hall to change out of his uniform, he said loudly over his shoulder so Grace could hear, “And I’ve got a business idea to talk over with your mother.” Grace, who was at the stove serving the fish and fried potatoes on plates, rolled her eyes. Just what made him think her mother would be interested in one of his screwy business plans?

         “Call her,” Dwayne shouted again from the bathroom.

         Grace went to the bathroom and stood outside the door. “There’s no need to call her. She said to come if we could,” Grace explained. “I think she’s just serving drinks and that cocktail cereal-mix she makes up in the oven. It’ll be an early night since everyone has to work tomorrow.”

As soon as they ate, Grace ran to get herself and Glory ready to go before something happened to change Dwayne’s mind.

*

         Even though she hurried, when the Tylers pulled into Vera’s driveway, everyone else was already there. Her brother Benny was in the large living room of the old house with Vera, demonstrating his latest dance step. Vera, who’d always been a quick study, followed right along.

         “Gracie,” Benny called to Grace, “come dance with me. Vera’s already got it.”

         “Is this the samba?” Grace asked, bubbling over with excitement.

         On his way to Grace, Benny grabbed Glory and twirled her around the living room before she ran to play with her cousin Carlos, Pauline’s son. Carlos was underneath Vera’s large dining room table busily building a skyscraper out of dominos and cards.

         “Glory, you’ll be a great little dancer someday,” Benny called after his niece, “just stick with your Uncle Ben.”

         Glory turned and giggled before she joined Carlos.

         Grace wasn’t surprised to see that Rudolf and Vera’s two boys hadn’t stuck around. Her nephews were already in high school and seldom hung around for their mother’s impromptu dance parties. They often teased their mother and Grace by going out the door while they sang, “It must be jelly ‘cause jam don’t shake like that,” lyrics they’d heard on one of their mother’s records.

         The whole family—even Dwayne—laughed as Benny playfully grabbed Grace and dipped her all the way to the floor before they even started to dance. Used to her brother’s antics, she followed the movement gracefully and came up ready to copy Benny step for step, with her eyes on her brother’s feet.

         Rudolf sat in a corner of the living room in a big easy chair, reading the paper. When the dancers stopped to change records, his twinkling eyes peeked over the paper and he called out encouragement to Vera. Rudolf was never an enthusiastic dancer, but he liked his wife to look good on the dance floor. Vera told Grace she could always count on Rudolf to dance the night away—as long as they played nothing but waltzes. A popular dancer, Vera was never short of partners at the officers’ club, so she was content to let Rudolf sit and visit with their friends whenever they went out for the night.

         With barely a nod to the other members of the family, Dwayne headed for Rudolf. He was too dense to notice that the colonel pulled his paper up over his face when he saw his brother-in-law coming his way. Before Dwayne could sit down on a couch across from the colonel, he had to move a pile of fabric and carpet swatches that Vera was using in her latest redecorating project.

         “Jesussss-Christ,” Dwayne said as he looked for a place to lay the pile of samples. “You oughta kick Vera’s butt for spendin’ so much of your money.”

         Rudolf put down his paper and gave him a stony stare. Dwayne could barely hear him with the music blaring, so Rudolf was sure no one else heard him say, “What my wife and I do with our money is our business, Dwayne.” He didn’t say anymore before he picked up his paper and began to read again.

         That put Dwayne’s tail between his legs and he didn’t know what to do next. How could Rudolf not be mad as hell about the money Vera spent? He wasn’t prepared for such a rebuff. He should have shut up, but Dwayne blundered on, like a cannon that rolled downhill and picked up speed as its metal wheels banged over the rocks.

         “Well, if it were me, I wouldn’t have no use for a woman who spent my money and did nothing but play bridge all day.” Rudolf made no reply as he gave Dwayne another icy stare and went to make himself a fresh drink. He didn’t bother to offer his brother-in-law one. Dwayne didn’t even notice the slight; he was dumbfounded that his last statement hadn’t turned Rudolf around and made him see things his way. It was all so clear to him. Couldn’t Rudolf see Vera would drain his bank account dry?

         Rudolf never came back, and instead disappeared without a word into his bedroom. Left alone with his gangly legs jutting out from the low couch, Dwayne finally made an awkward move to the other side of the room to talk to Pauline. He looked down at the high heels she wore. Well, if Rudolf wouldn’t listen to him, at least he could straighten Pauline out.

         “Pauline,” Dwayne said as he pointed to her feet, “the only other women I’ve seen wear shoes like that were whores. You’d better stop buying those things. People will start to talk.”

         “Oh, tell me, Dwayne, have you seen a lot of whores? Where?” she asked as she rolled her eyes at her mother. Dwayne was the only man who made her husband Boyd—although he was absent—look good to her. In Spanish, she said something to her mother about Vera and snakes. He was pretty sure Pauline was telling her mother that Vera had said he was a rattlesnake. Dwayne didn’t understand the rest, but he’d heard the Spanish word for snake—serpiente—often on post. Momma nodded, and pretended to talk about Glory in Spanish, but Dwayne wasn’t fooled. He knew they were putting him down again.

         Dwayne was beside himself, but he didn’t want to go home until he’d accomplished his main mission: to get money from Grace’s mother for his ranch. Grace was still dancing with Benny. Vera and Pauline had joined them, so Dwayne rushed to the kitchen and poured two cups of coffee. It should be easy to get the old lady to do things his way. She didn’t even know how to read English. For sure, she’d do what he told her.

         “Momma, I’ve been thinkin’,” Dwayne said to his mother-in-law as he handed her a cup of coffee. “Why on earth are you still living in that big ole house by yourself? You should sell that thing and move into an apartment.”

         “Why, what would I do with myself in an apartment?” Gregoria asked. “I’d have no garden. Besides, I’m happy where I am; all of my memories of Juan are there in that house. It’s the only home we ever had that was ours.”

         “Momma, you’d better think about it, you’re gettin’ old, and one of these days you’re gonna fall in that house and there won’t be anyone there to help you. Besides, you could get a ton of money for that old place. Property values are going through the roof around here.”

         “Dwayne,” said Momma, puzzled by Dwayne’s forcefulness, “I don’t need money. I live simply and I have everything I want.”

         “Well,” Dwayne pushed on, “you should be thinkin’ of Glory. She’s gonna have to go to college someday, ya’ know, and if you took the money from the house and invested it in my cattle ranch, you’d have a nice little nest egg for her when she needs it.” Dwayne thought it was a pretty convincing argument; everyone knew that she adored Glory.

         “Oh, so you want me to sell my house and give you the money?” Dwayne saw the beginning of a smile at the corners of Gregoria’s lips. “My coffee needs more sugar. Would you get me some?” She handed her cup to Dwayne who was glad to have an excuse to escape to the kitchen. He needed to think. The old lady wasn’t convinced. What should he say next?

        When Dwayne could think of nothing else to say, he couldn’t control the anger he felt. He had to get out of that house before he started to beat the shit out of everyone. In fact, if the two men hadn’t been there, things could have gotten real ugly.

         What makes these women so damned uppity? he wondered. When he was growing up on the ranch, his mother never dressed up, wore high heels, and spent all kinds of money to decorate her house like these women did. His dad would have beat the livin’ tar out of her and told her to go feed the cows. He always told Dwayne that women who didn’t do what their husbands told them were whores, and should be treated like whores. Clean and simple. No ifs, ands, or buts.

         With no warning, Dwayne came back to the living room and shouted, “Grace! Time to go home. Get Glory and let’s get started. Gotta work tomorrow.” He walked over to the phonograph and put a long scratch in the spinning record as he took the needle off to stop the music. Startled, Grace gathered up Glory and raced out the door, while Dwayne pushed them from behind. As they got to their car, they heard the music start up again, louder than before; he was sure it was Pauline who turned the music up as a final taunt to him.

*

         In the car, Grace listened to Dwayne’s opinions of her family all the way home. He’d worked himself into a real good lather as he went on and on about what whores her sisters were. Grace was afraid to take her eyes off of the tall, blond soldier. At any moment, she thought, he might hit her.

         Dwayne held off his anger until they were in their quarters. Then his rage flew out of control. While he yelled, he pulled Grace into the hallway, where she was trapped in a space just wide enough for one person to pass. First, an arm flew out from his body and he backhanded Grace across the face and sent her spinning into the opposite wall. When she bounced off the sheetrock, he was there to catch her. He twisted her arm behind her back and jerked it up each time he spoke.

         “Damn little whore. You’re just like your sisters, you’re all nothing but whores.” He pulled up on her arm again so hard that Grace cried out, but he didn’t loosen his grip.

         “And look at your skin. It’s as black as a colored’s. What do you do, bake in the sun while I’m at work?”

         He pulled up on Grace’s arm a third time. “I don’t know why I even bother with you. You’re more useless than a tit on a bullet.”

         Grace crumbled in the hallway. “Stop. Please stop. You’re hurting me,” she begged.

         “Damn little pepper-belly,” he raged, “I’ll show you how a real man treats whores.”

         “I’m not a whore, Dwayne, and you know it,” Grace cried as she shielded her face.

         “Don’t you talk back to me, don’t you dare talk back to me. I hear what the men in town say about you and your sisters.”

            Grace had heard it all before. Felt it all before. Belittling her made Dwayne feel important.

   Made him feel more like a man.

Made him feel like sex.

         When he pulled her into the bedroom, Grace’s battered mind scurried away like a prairie mouse under sagebrush. Only the faint smell of Dwayne’s Camel cigarettes and unwashed underarm odor managed to creep underneath the mental barriers she put up to survive.

         Grace didn’t bother to ask anymore what the men had said; she’d heard it all before. In past fights, she had asked which men said bad things about her and her sisters, but Dwayne would never give her a name. She finally figured out that there were no “other men,” just the mean and crazy ramblings of a Texan who looked for any excuse to use his fists and feel superior. Now, she didn’t even listen to the words; she only tried to protect herself as much as she could.

         As Grace was pulled back to the bedroom, she saw Glory run for her closet; she carried a plate of leftover perch from the table. Grace had been so anxious to go to her sister’s that she’d forgotten to put it in the refrigerator.

         “Glory,” she screamed, but Dwayne pulled her back when she tried to run to their daughter. “Dwayne, let me go. Glory has the fish. Dwayne, please, she’ll choke on the bones.”

         Dwayne didn’t even look Glory’s way as he threw Grace on the bed and started to unbuckle his pants.

         It broke Grace’s heart to know that their daughter had begun to hide in her closet as soon as she started to walk; she began to take food into the closet with her as soon as she could reach the plates on the table.

         Tonight, Glory ate leftover bony perch while she hid on top of a pile of her father’s duffel bags in her dark closet. But other nights, Grace had found her in the middle of the night curled around a plate of fried chicken, or cold biscuits—whatever she could grab before she ran for her closet bunker.

         When Dwayne’s anger and lust finally exhausted him, he began to cool off. Just before he went to sleep, he told Grace, “I love you Grace; I’ll try to never hit you again.”

               He said the same thing every time.

   Every time, it was a lie.

         And, every time, she talked herself into believing him. What made her think he’d ever change?

         In the middle of the night, Grace dragged her aching body into her daughter’s room, moved the sleeping Glory from the closet, and put her in her Army-issue metal bed. She shivered even though the heat was over a hundred degrees as she crawled back into bed next to Dwayne. She could have slept with Glory on her bed, but it was too small for an adult to be comfortable, and Grace was already hurting. There was no place else to go except the couch in the living room, and the one time she’d slept there, Dwayne got angry all over again. It just wasn’t worth it.

         Once, the morning after a bad night, Glory asked Grace if her daddy would come after her next, and cried, “What’ll I do, Mommy? What’ll I do?” Grace looked at her panicked little face and promised her that her father would never hit her, but Glory wasn’t convinced. Finally, Grace promised to protect her if her father ever did come after her, but deep inside, she didn’t know how. She couldn’t even protect herself.

*

         The next morning, Dwayne was gone before Grace put on the coffee. She sat down in the morning sun that seeped through the worn window shades and began to sew. As her machine clicked over pins and fabric at a comforting, soothing pace, she began to pull herself together. Not much longer, she told herself. Not much longer. At times, she winced as her sore ribs accidentally rubbed against the edge of the table.

            Grace didn’t hear Glory come into the room, so she was startled when an excited voice right next to her shouted, “Mom, what are you makin’ today?”

         With great effort, Grace turned and lifted her daughter onto her lap. Her ribs were throbbing, so she gave her a careful but affectionate hug. While they cuddled, she pulled out the clips that held Glory’s blond hair in dog-ears. Grace ran her fingers through hair that was sticky with a combination of tears and fried fish from the night before.

         “We have to wash your hair today. Might as well wait until you come in for your nap, okay?” She quickly pulled Glory’s hair back into a low ponytail. Without a shampoo, there wasn’t much else she could do with it.

         “Okay,” Glory quickly agreed because she was anxious to go outside and play,.

         Grace marveled at this creation with light skin, green eyes, and brownish-blond hair that she’d given birth to. Her own skin and hair were dark. How could a child of hers look so little like her, even with Dwayne as the father? Other children from similar marriages were a lot darker, although Dwayne was exceptionally light—he almost looked like an albino. The only other explanation was the Spanish blood on her mother’s side of the family. She knew that many of them had light hair and blue eyes.

         Strangers assumed Glory was Dwayne’s from another marriage, and Grace always smiled and said she didn’t blame them. But, deep inside, she resented it. Glory was hers, even if everything about her, from her blond hair to her long legs, looked like Dwayne.

         “Hon, are you hungry?” Grace gingerly rocked Glory on her lap to avoid bumping her sore ribs.

         “No, what are you makin’?” Glory asked as she looked at Grace’s machine on the kitchen table.

  “Well, I thought my girl could use some cooler play clothes. It’s starting to get hot.”

                     “For me? Can I see? Oh, boy, can I have pockets?”

   “You want pockets?” Grace laughed at Glory’s excitement.

   “Yes. Pockets and lace.”

   “Where shall I put the lace?”

         “On the seat, like Linda Joy has. Her mom gots her these panties with ruffles all over the seat so when she bends over all you see is ruffles, ruffles, ruffles. I love ruffles.” Glory bounced off Grace’s lap and danced around the kitchen floor, as she bent over and patted her bottom with both hands.

   “What else do you want?”

      “Could I have a turtle?”

“A tortuga? Where did you get that idea?”

“Linda Joy has a turtle. She calls it Fluffy. She’s teaching it to talk.”

“I’ll have to think about that. Are you sure you’re not hungry?”

      “No. Sew, Mommy.”

         Grace smiled to herself as she put the tiny pieces of material together. Glory was so small she could make her a whole outfit from the odds and ends leftover from the sewing she did for her relatives and friends. That was how, even on a very limited budget, Grace had filled Glory’s closet with lacy dresses, colorful play clothes, and even a rabbit fur coat. The coat, made from a couple of old rabbit stoles that her older sister picked up at a church bazaar, looked “Damn dandy,” Vera had said.

      “When will it be finished?” Glory wanted to know as she pulled herself up over the edge of the table to get a better look at her new outfit.

   “Before you know it, if you eat some breakfast and go outside and play.”

   “Okay.” She stood on tiptoes to see what was on the counter, “Can I have that tortilla?”

   “Yes. Why don’t you put some oleo on it?”

   “If I eat it all, then can I go outside?”

         Yes,” said Grace. She watched Glory sit down on the cool floor with the flour tortilla and a small glass of red Kool-Aid; their food budget didn’t allow for extras like juice. Although, somehow, when Dwayne went to the commissary, he always found enough change for his favorites: coffee, tea, and cocoa for chocolate cakes and homemade fudge. Grace made the fudge from a recipe on the back of the cocoa can and topped it with wild pecans, so it wasn’t expensive to make.

         Mostly Dwayne spent every penny he could scrounge to build up his mother’s shabby cattle ranch in Texas, even if it meant they had to cut down on food items that Glory needed, like milk and eggs.

         When Glory started to eat her tortilla, Grace went back to sewing. As she eased the material under the presser foot, she felt a wave of anger wash over her. What kind of a breakfast was that for a little girl? Shoot! She and all her brothers and sisters ate better than that during The Great Depression, Poppa saw to it.

         Grace muttered, “If Poppa could feed all of us, why can’t this good-for-nothing-son-of-a-gun feed one little girl?” She glanced down at her daughter. “And how can Dwayne think he’s such a big shot when he has money to buy food for a bunch of dumb cows, but none for his only child, who doesn’t even have milk or orange juice?” She mumbled over her sewing machine.

   The machine answered with click-click. Click-click.

   Since Grace didn’t drive, she’d have to ask her sisters to pick up a few groceries for her with some of the sewing money she hid from Dwayne at her mother’s. They weren’t expecting any company that Dwayne would want to impress, so she knew he wouldn’t bring any extra food home.

         Sometimes, in frustration, Grace would complain that Dwayne spent too much on his ranch, but she was always fearful that she would go too far and make him angry. Besides, she told herself, any day now he’d be sent on another overseas assignment. Whole units of soldiers shipped out everyday from Fort Sill on post-war assignments to occupy Japan. Most would be gone two to three years.

      Her plan was to wait until he left, then divorce him. Once he was out of town, it would be easier to keep custody of Glory, so why risk getting beaten again? Any day. Any day now, Grace told herself as she rested her forehead on the cool metal of her old Singer sewing machine and tried to steady her breath.

         Daily, Grace held onto the dream of her and Glory in a little house in which the two of them lived happily alone. She would start a sewing business; Glory would play in the backyard by a flower garden. Her heart skipped a beat whenever she dared to think she might even have a car. It wouldn’t have to be new, just something to take her to the grocery store. On the way, she pictured, she’d stop by her mother’s for coffee. Someday, she promised herself. Someday. All she had to do was be smart enough to keep Glory, and get out of her marriage alive.

         While she held on from day to day, Dwayne strutted his six-foot, two-inch frame around the small Army quarters and acted as if he held all the cards. His favorite threat was to tell her, “I’ll take Glory away from you if you ever try to leave me. All the judges are white,” he liked to say, “and they’ll do whatever I tell them to do.”

                 From the stories about the judges that she heard in town, Grace didn’t doubt it for a minute.

9.  Down On the Ranch

         Dwayne hadn’t told anyone at the ranch he was coming to Texas, and no one was around when he got there.

         He drove down the dusty road that ran along his property and got angrier at each passed fence post. The fence was still in the same sorry shape it was in when he was there last. Posts leaned every which way, and barbed wire sprawled on the ground in a lot of places. Before he ever got to the ranch, he had to stop his car and shoo five of his own cows off the road. “Where the hell is that foreman of mine?” he cursed. He only had a few days to help him get things in order before he had to go back to the post.

         Back in his car, he raced up the road to Cord’s shack, ready to read him the riot act, only to find he wasn’t there, either. “I’ll just have to get a rope and pull the damn cows back over the fence myself,” he muttered. He tried the doorknob on the tool shed and let out a yell. “The son-of-a-bitchin’ door is locked!” He kicked the door on the shed until the boards cracked. “Cows roamin’ all over the place—lucky they weren’t run over—and the son-of-a-bitchin’ shed that holds a two-dollar rope is locked up tight.” Dwayne all but frothed at the mouth. He hollered and swore in every direction, “God damn it to hell!”

         As he yelled, the cows moved in on him, mooing with every step. It was certain Cord hadn’t gotten around to feeding them yet, and they were looking for dinner. “Damn cows would’ve starved to death,” Dwayne shouted into the sky, “if I hadn’t showed up.” He beat his fists on the hood of his car out of pure frustration and anger. The cows seemed to take his pounding as some kind of dinner bell; they moved closer and closer until their wet, slimy noses pushed against him.

         Totally exasperated, he broke down the door to the shed, grabbed a bag of feed and a rope, and went to work. As he pulled each loose cow back over the downed fence, each one broke into a trot and headed for the feed bin. “Damn almighty!” He yelled after them. “You can walk over a broken fence to get out, but you need help to get back in over the same damn broken fence?” He couldn’t decide if they were ornery or just plain stupid. Maybe a lot of both.

         And where was that useless foreman he’d hired? Dwayne looked around at the tractors and bulldozers he’d borrowed from Aunt Bett so that Cord could dig a pond for the cows. Far as he could tell, they’d never even been moved since he brought them over. Well, Cord would have to explain to Aunt Bett why the machinery was starting to rust. Damn. She was gonna be mad, and he couldn’t blame her. Not one bit.

         With the cows fed, he began work on the fence, but it was really a two-man job, and it was hot, so he decided to wait for Cord in his shack. Another burst of anger erupted from him when he tried to turn the doorknob. The shack, too, was locked. He peeked in the window and swore again when he saw the floor, littered with empty beer bottles, crumpled cigarette packages, and other assorted garbage.

         Just then, he saw a green pickup pulling a trail of lazy dust behind it, headed his way. He watched it as it leisurely made its way down the road, like a cow walking away when the feed bin was empty. He was more than annoyed that Cord didn’t even speed up when he saw Dwayne’s car parked in front of his place.

         Dwayne crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the fender of his Ford and waited impatiently for his foreman to drive up. His narrowed eyes seethed with disgust as he smoked his Camel and stared bullets through Cord’s windshield.

         He expected that Cord would be ashamed of himself, like a little boy who got caught when he skipped school. He wanted to see fear in Cord’s apologetic eyes.     

         “Why didn’t you call and tell me you were coming?” Cord demanded to know as he jumped out of his pickup.

         Surprised, Dwayne fell back against his car, threw his cigarette to the ground, clenched his fists by his sides and shot back, “What do you mean, ‘Let you know I was coming,’ you son-of-a-bitch? This is my ranch and I can come any damn time I want to, by God. It’s not my fault you got caught with your pants down.”

         Dwayne was angry, but he didn’t want to actually fight Cord, and he was relieved when he saw his Aunt Bett driving her John Deere tractor up the road. What was that thing that hung over her head? At closer look, he saw that she had tied a big pink umbrella to her tractor.

         No one bothered to try to talk until she parked the big machine and shut off the engine that roared like the mechanical king of the fields that it was. Dwayne lifted her tiny body down from the high seat.

         “Aunt Bett, what are you doing out in this heat in an open tractor?” He asked as he lifted her down and hugged her at the same time.

         “Have to drive the tractor. They took away my driver’s license after they tricked me into taking that eye test.” She followed his gaze to the umbrella and explained, “The umbrella helps a little. Besides, got to keep my face from wrinklin’.”

         Dwayne looked at the weathered, leathered face that was so old people had lost track of its years. Was she eighty-nine? Ninety-two?

         “Your face looks fine to me, Aunt Bett. You should stay out of this heat, though.”

         “Would’ve, ’ceptin’ I saw you drive by. Whyn’t ya stop? Could’ve cooled ya off with something cold to drink.”

         Before Dwayne could answer, Cord stuck his hand in front of Dwayne’s face and said, “That’s a good idea. Give me a coupla bucks, Dwayne, and I’ll go get us some cold beers.”

         Dwayne didn’t bother to answer, he just turned and stared at Cord. The long, hateful stare hung in the hot air until Aunt Bett broke the silence, “No matter, ya’ll come over ta my house. I’ll cool ya both off with some iced tea and black boy cake.”

         “You still bakin’, Aunt Bett?” Dwayne asked as he headed to his car. When he saw her heading toward her tractor he called to her and said, “You ride with me; we’ll fetch your tractor when it cools off some.”

         When Aunt Bett pulled the car door shut, she turned to Dwayne and laughed, “No, I don’t bake no more. Haven’t for years. Not since I put a batch of strawberry jam on the stove to can, and took a nap. Boy,” she laughed, “I had myself a mess then. There’s still jam on the kitchen ceiling, don’t have any way to get it off. But gettin’ back to the cake, your brothers’ bratty girls bring me something right regular nowadays, always tryin’ to sweeten me up so I’ll give them a piece or two of my antique furniture. I never do, of course. The minute I start giving away stuff, they’ll never go home and I won’t never get no peace.”

         “Better watch those spoiled nieces of mine, Aunt. They’re used to gettin’ their way. Don’t know for sure if anyone’s ever told them no. And I ain’t never heard of them liftin’ a finger around any of my brothers’ ranches, have you?”

         “No. Can’t say as I have. Don’t know as how they’d work in them fancy clothes they got anyway. I don’t even think they really cook all that stuff they bring me either. I’m bettin’ their moms are abakin’ it for them.”

         “I just can’t figure out why they built those big new houses, now they want to go fill ‘em up with old furniture. No offense.”

         “None taken. I told them all that stuff was so old it came over in a covered wagon.”

         Dwayne parked the car next to Aunt Bett’s kitchen door.

         “What’d they say?”

         “Asked me if I still had the wagon.” They both laughed, and Aunt Bett waved away his help to get her out of the car.

         Before they went into the house, Cord slowed his car down and yelled out his window, “I’m gonna grab some beers. Be back soon.” Off he drove in a cloud of thirsty dust.

         Dwayne went into the kitchen and sat on one of Aunt Bett’s two kitchen chairs. After she poured the iced tea and put a bowl of fresh strawberries on the table, she moved the extra chair next to the wall and brought out an old wooden pear crate to sit on. Aunt Bett never sat on any regular seat that wasn’t painted John Deere green; she’d had back trouble for years. When Dwayne looked at the empty chair his aunt had moved out of the way, Aunt Bett cautiously said, “Most likely, Cord won’t be back tonight. He’s got lots of friends at the tavern.”

         Dwayne gulped his iced tea. It had a distinct flavor of East Texas well water, like a combination of rust and oil. He tried to make Aunt Bett think he didn’t care where Cord was by announcing, “Long as he’s there at sun-up tomorrow, ready to work.”

      Aunt Bett got real quiet and looked down at the sugar crystals that were spilled on the table when Dwayne had sugared his iced tea. She moved them around with the tip of her finger from one spot to another, carefully avoiding Dwayne’s eyes. Dwayne got the idea that the chances that Cord would be up bright and early tomorrow and ready to work weren’t very good, either.

         “So how’s the family?” Aunt Bett finally asked.

         “Fine. They’re getting ready to move back to town when I leave for Japan.” Dwayne knew Aunt Bett wasn’t really interested in Grace and Gloria, so he didn’t say anymore. He wanted to tell her he was leaving Grace, but he just didn’t know how. Besides, he really wasn’t ready to get into an I-told-you-so conversation.

         “How was the trip?”

         “Hot. Long—there was one thing different—a cougar ran up along the side of my car for a while.”

         “You should have run over him. All those mangy cats do is kill our cows.”

         “Have any around here?”

         “Naw, run the cougars and wolves off long ago. Texas is changing. You can be in Dallas now in under two spits of a cricket.”

         Aunt Bett and Dwayne talked half the night and he finally bunked on Aunt Bett’s couch that was about two feet shorter than he was. Before he went to sleep, he looked over the furniture that his nieces wanted so bad. Just looked like old junk to him. That old pie safe, for instance. With its pine construction and punched tin doors, it was about as useful as a light bulb on a bale of hay. To his way of thinkin’, anyway. And that ugly old oak china cabinet must be over a hundred years old. Who in their right mind would want that? Now, that bed of Aunt Bett’s was special and probably worth quite a bit. Its headboard almost touched the ceiling, and it was heavily carved out of solid black walnut.

         He had always wondered about that bed. It must have come through Aunt Bett’s side of the family. No Tyler that Dwayne ever heard of had furniture like that. Aunt Bett was originally from New Orleans. ‘Course that was years ago. Maybe that bed had come out of a southern mansion somewhere.

         Before the sun was up the next morning, Aunt Bett banged around the kitchen and boiled coffee in an old tin pot while she fried eggs in her favorite wrought iron skillet. The smell of the fresh eggs mingled with the spicy aroma of the home-cured, thick-sliced bacon and slowed Dwayne down for over an hour. After he ate, he helped his aunt clean up the kitchen and wiped up some of the jam on the ceiling left from her last canning adventure. The ceiling was just inches above his head, it was easy for him to wipe a soapy rag over the dried red splotches.

         As he cleaned the ceiling, he asked, “Aunt Bett, you’ve got a mess of black walnuts out there on the ground. What are you planning to do with them?”

         “I never can use them all. I just beg everyone who comes to my door to take a bagful home with ’em. There’s paper sacks by the door if you want some.”

         “Might take some to Glory. Not much else to take her from around here.”

         “Help yourself. They taste real good in cookies, but they’re such a pain to crack. Ya gotta really want ‘em. Some fella stopped by the other day and offered to buy the tree from me. The whole tree! Said it wasn’t worth much, but he thought maybe he could sell it for a few bucks to the lumber companies.”

         “What’d you tell him?”

         “I run him off, like I did that joker who wanted to buy my land for hardly no money just so he could build a lot of cheap stick houses on it. Imagine. Land I’ve spent my whole life buildin’ up the topsoil on and he wants to cover it up with asphalt. Thought I’d have to get the shotgun after him just to get him off my property. Then he said he ‘understood I needed time to think it over,’ and he’d be back. The jackass.”

         Alarmed, Dwayne asked, “Why don’t you call Cord or one of the other men around here to take care of those city-slickers?”

         “There’s never any time. They hit the door so quick, and then they’re gone quicker than water in a well. I never even have time to load my shotgun. I’d get me a mean ole dog, but he’d probably crap on my strawberries and I’d get so darned mad I’d end up shootin’ him.”

         “Well, a dog probably isn’t a good idea. He might knock you down and make you break a hip or something. You don’t need that.” Dwayne gave his aunt a quick hug before he went out the door.

         “Better go start that fence. First, I have to go into town and buy some more posts and wire. Good thing I cashed a check before I left. I can’t find my savings book anywhere. Must have left it at a truck stop on the highway.”

         “Come back for supper tonight. I figure I can git a meal cooked as long as I stay awake and in the kitchen. I’ll bring you men some sandwiches and lemonade at noon.”

         “Thanks, Aunt Bett.” As he left the kitchen, his aunt was beginning to knock the fat off a piece of smoked ham with an old butcher knife before she put it in a pot with some fresh black-eyed peas. He knew she’d make some corn bread later to go with them. Always did.

         The heat built up right fast, and when Dwayne stepped off the porch, he decided he’d leave that tractor of Aunt Bett’s where it was. He and Cord would just drive over to her house for lunch. No use in her getting out and maybe getting heatstroke.

         He felt a pain in his chest every time he thought that something might happen to his aunt. After he’d lost his parents, one to an accident and the other to the mental hospital, he and his brothers and sisters had been homeless. The girls found a home right away with his mother’s sisters. Aunt Bett had taken in the boys when no one else wanted them. She’d been good to them too. But one night, in a fit of anger because Aunt Bett yelled at him for not feeding the pigs when he was supposed to, he’d run away to Fort Worth to join the Army. He was only fourteen, but he was big and strong for his age. At six feet tall, no one ever questioned his age.

         He always did regret that he’d left Aunt Bett. Soon after that, her husband died, and the rest of the boys left to join the Army too. Guess they were all anxious to be on their own. Dwayne would have never left if he’d known his brothers were going to leave and she was going to be left all alone.

         The fact that, as good as she was to Dwayne, she’d never accepted his Mexican wife and child hadn’t changed his feelings toward her none. Folks were just like that around here. “If only I’d never left,” Dwayne said softly to himself over and over. “I’d have my ranch right down the road from Aunt Bett, a normal family, and everything would be okay.”

         Thinking about his aunt made the short car ride to Cord’s shack even shorter. Before he knew it, he was in front of the outbuilding he let Cord live in. He’d been so deep in thought about his childhood that he didn’t notice until he was out of the car that Cord’s truck wasn’t there.

         “Damn,” Dwayne muttered to himself. “That good-for-nothing bastard knows we have to start work so I can get back to Fort Sill. Where the hell can he be?”

         Dwayne didn’t know where Cord was, but he had a pretty good idea what he’d been doing. Cord was always popular with the local girls. Anger mixed with jealousy. Dwayne was about ready to go into town alone and get the fence supplies when he saw Cord’s pickup as it sped down the road, dust flying everywhere.

         “Damn, you’re gonna scare the cows to death,” Dwayne said to him when he drove up.

         “Naw, they’re used to me,” Cord grinned. “Ready to go? Let’s take my pickup.”

         Dwayne climbed onto the high seat of Cord’s truck and slid his feet around so the empty beer bottles wouldn’t be underfoot. The empties rolled back and nestled around his feet like eggs around a hen.

         “Damn almighty, did you drink all this beer yourself?”

         “Naw, I had help,” Cord grinned. “A lot of help.” He grinned some more.

         Dwayne couldn’t help but grin a little himself. “I’m glad to hear it. We’ve got a lot of work to do, and it’s gonna be hot. Aunt Bett’s making us sandwiches for lunch. I’ve got to be out of here early next Sunday. Thought we might have some time to dig some on that pond after we finish the fence.” There was a total lack of enthusiasm on Cord’s part, but he let it go. No sense startin’ out in a pissin’ contest before the day even got started.

         It took no time at all to pick up the fence supplies; they were the only customers in the feed store. “Most other people are smart enough to stay home in this heat,” the man behind the counter groused as he took Dwayne’s money and sat down again in front of the fan. He made a half-hearted gesture with his gnarled hand at the door. It was clear the cranky old codger wasn’t going to help them load their purchases into the pickup. On his way out, Dwayne looked at the old rusted and bent thermometer hanging on the wall and whistled when he read: a hundred and one―and it was still early. For once, Dwayne didn’t stop to chat the way he normally did with strangers. Best to just get in and get out and get to work, to his way of thinkin’.

         On the trip back, Cord made a quick swing into the same tavern he’d just left a few hours before.

         “Gonna get us some beers and ice for the cooler. We’re sure as hell going to be sweatin’ it off today. How’s about I pick up some orange pop for Aunt Bett? She must be runnin’ low.”

         Dwayne nodded and reached into his shirt pocket to hand Cord a twenty. Well, if he knew what Aunt Bett’s favorite pop was, he must be checkin’ in on her some, and Dwayne liked that. Maybe Cord wasn’t more trouble than he was worth, after all. His hostile feelings toward his foreman began to melt away like the crushed ice that clung to the outside of a cold beer on a picnic table.

         By the time Cord came out of the tavern with the ice and drinks, it was hotter than a barbecue pit inside the truck, and Dwayne didn’t complain when Cord handed him a cold beer that had been iced down for a couple of hours. Cord joked that there were too many to fit in the ice chest anyway.

         They were on the road by Aunt Bett’s place when Dwayne looked out and saw Aunt Bett bouncing on her tractor as she drove around and around in circles in her south pasture. He watched with alarm at the pink umbrella furiously bobbing over her head as she raced the machine around in tight circles.

         “What the hell?” Dwayne asked. He didn’t have to tell Cord to head for the nearest opening in the fence.

         “She must have walked down to your shack to get her tractor,” Dwayne moaned. This was all his fault. He should have known she wouldn’t sit still while they worked.

         “What’s she doin’?” Cord asked. “She don’t have no work to do out there. Plantin’s over.”

         “Looks like she’s got heatstroke.” Dwayne didn’t take his eyes off his aunt. “Aunt Bett, Aunt Bett!” he called as he leaned out the pickup window and beat on the side of the truck with an open hand. She just kept a’goin’ in circles, and didn’t show any sign of hearing, or even seeing them, so Cord put his truck in park and ran after her. With cautious timing, he jumped onto the tractor when it came around again and brought it to a stop.

         “Put her in the truck, Cord. I’ll drive the tractor back to her house. Maybe give her one of those orange sody pops.”

         Cord nodded in agreement. Neither of them even tried to talk to Aunt Bett. Their minds were busy trying to figure out what to do next. Call a doctor? Take her to the hospital? What?

         At Aunt Bett’s house, both of the men scurried around and tried not to bump into each other in the tiny rooms. Dwayne got his aunt into bed and Cord brought her a glass of ice from the beer chest in his truck with just a little water in it to sip on. She was much too weak to hold onto the pop he had tried to give her. As soon as she went to sleep, the two went to the living room and tried to figure out what they were gonna do.

         “Think she’ll go to a hospital?” Cord asked.

         “Not likely. Besides, at her age, they might scare her to death,” Dwayne worried.

         “Should we call those girls who are always bringing cakes and cookies over here?”

         “Naw. She wouldn’t get a lick of rest with those girls in the house. I’m thinkin’ I’d better call my sisters. They’re good girls; Aunt Bett gets along with them. They’ve both got new jobs coming up. Maybe I can pay them a little bit until Aunt Bett gets back on her feet. They might need some money for work clothes or something.”

         “What about the fence?” Cord asked. “Are we done for today?”

         Dwayne took an annoyed breath and said, “I’ll make you a deal. Let’s take the rest of the day off so I can get things settled around here. If things go well, we can work real hard to finish the fencing in the next couple of days, and just leave the pond for the fall, when it’s not so hot. I won’t be here to help you, but Aunt Bett’s equipment should be all you need.”

         “Yeah, we’d better at least get the fencing done. Hadn’t had a chance to tell you yet, but we’ve got three cows missing. Don’t know where they went off to,” Cord looked down at his feet, afraid to look into Dwayne’s eyes.

         “Hell’s bells, Cord, why didn’t you tell me that sooner?” His anger began to well up inside him again.

         Cord had stopped listening to Dwayne and was looking around with a worried expression.

         “Do you smell something burning?” Cord asked, sniffing the air.

         “Jesus Christ, the black-eyed peas!” Dwayne yelled, running to the kitchen.

*

         The next Sunday, Dwayne packed his car in the dark and left early in the morning. Aunt Bett was recovered enough to keep telling Dwayne’s sisters, “Go home. All you’re doing around here is eatin’ up all my vittles.” Dwayne hated to leave her, but Cord promised him that he’d look in on her when the girls left.

         They’d managed to get the fencing done. Had to, what with the cows walking off left and right. Dwayne had spent his remaining days at the ranch pushing Cord to his lazy limits. He didn’t really have any choice. If he didn’t get back to the post on time, that First Sergeant would kick his butt all the way to the stockade. Maybe if he had been on better terms with him, he could have gotten extra leave and stayed a few days longer, but with things as they were, he knew there was no chance of getting an extension on his leave.

         Sunday morning, Aunt Bett insisted upon getting up to fuss around in the kitchen and make him some sandwiches for the road and a thermos of coffee. He didn’t have the heart to tell her not to bother, that he liked to stop at greasy spoons along the highway. Anyway, it seemed that Aunt Bett was determined to get rid of the Thermos that she had no use for. A lot of her cabinets looked as if they’d already been cleaned out. She’d kept only the cooking utensils that she needed on a daily basis. It was clear the old girl knew that she didn’t have much time left.

         He knew he’d never see Aunt Bett again as he gave her a hug goodbye. There was no way she could hang on for another three years until he got back from Japan. She knew it too. What could he say to her? How could he tell her how much she meant to him? Even if he tried, he knew the tough old lady would shut him down as soon as he got started. Aunt Bett had a heart bigger than a John Deere, but she wasn’t one to gush. Life on the prairie had been harsh, and any tears she’d had were cried out long ago.                   

         The last thing he carried to the car was the bag of black walnuts. He cradled them in his arms like they were a piece of Aunt Bett. And, in a way, they were. Even though she wasn’t watching, he backed out the driveway, he backed out real slow, so he wouldn’t throw dust on Aunt Bett’s chinaberry trees.

         Dwayne couldn’t help but wonder who she’d leave her farm to. She didn’t have any kids of her own and his brother never even bothered to come and see her. For sure, she wouldn’t give it to her brothers’ daughters. He’d never ask her for it though, because she’d done enough for him when he was a kid. ’Course, if she ever did leave it to him, he could sure make good use of it. “What am I thinkin’?” Dwayne mumbled to himself. “As long as she thinks I’ll have Grace and Glory with me, there’s no way I’ll get her farm. The other relatives would dig her up just to skin her if she let Mexicans in here.”