The Mother Lode (6 page)

“And that was the end of it?”

“Not quite. The schoolmarm seemed to take me on as a special cause, and she kept coming around with books and primers and such. They had pictures and the alphabet. And I snuck 'em into the woods and looked at 'em for quite some time.”

She listened with great interest. “And then what finally happened, Joe?”

“My pappy caught me lookin' at them books and he skinned my behind with a willow switch till I couldn't sit down for a week! He put them word books in a feed sack and slung 'em over the cemetery's fence, and I don't know what happened to 'em after that. I do know that the very next time he went to town, he looked up that schoolmarm and he musta gave her billy-be-damned because she never came by again. Got married a few years later and went off, but the settlement found another teacher.”

“I was the schoolteacher for Genoa before my husband died, so your story touches my heart,” Ellen said after a long pause during which she seemed to reach back into her past and find pain. “Believe it or not, there are still parents with the same attitude your parents held. And there is nothing as sad as a wasted mind, Joe. Nothing in the world as sad.”

“I reckon not,” he replied, not at all sure of what she was talking about but believing she was right about learning and the mind.

“Can Fiona read and write?” Ellen asked, suddenly changing course.

“Sure can,” Joe answered proudly. “She and her mother used to read the Bible most every night on the wagon train. And her father read from the Good Book when Fiona's dear mother died on the trail of a fever.”

“That must have been very hard on them both.”

Joe frowned. “It was terrible hard on Fiona. But her father is the kind of man that don't know what he lost even when it's gone. He's a big, braggin' sort who drinks too damn much . . . not that I haven't gotten drunk many a time myself and am fit to judge . . . but Mr. McCarthy is the kinda man I'd just like to kill.”

“Joe!” Ellen cried with shock.

He realized at once that he'd upset her. “Only a figure of speech, ma'am.”

She studied him closely for a moment, then said, “There is something I have to ask you. And, frankly, I'm not sure that I want to know the answer.”

He didn't understand. “If you want the truth, I'll give 'er to you. If you
don't
want the truth, then I'll figure that out by your expression and I'll tell you what I think you'd want to hear.”

Joe paused. “That's about the best I can do for you, Mrs. Johnson.”

“If that is how it would be, then there isn't really much point of me asking about that bag of human scalps they found on the mountainside and threw away, is there?”

“They tossed my scalps!”

“Yes. Now what I
won't
ask you is how they came to be in your possession.”

“Fair enough,” Joe said with relief. He was not about to reveal to her that he'd once killed six Piegan Indians single-handedly and earned the vaunted nickname Man Killer, which he was still called in the north high mountain country.

“But,” she continued, choosing her words with care, “I do have to tell you that those scalps have turned the entire Genoa settlement against you, Joe. They have been the cause of even more gossip than my taking care of you out here in this shed.”

Joe thought about that for a long moment and said, “I realize now that you have gone way out on a limb for me, Mrs. Johnson. Too far out on a limb, I reckon. And I promise you that I will make sure that you are rewarded . . . whether you want to be or not, and that I will leave as soon as is physically possible for me to leave. And finally, I am sorry for the trouble and gossip. I know how it can affect a woman because it hurt Fiona something terrible on our wagon train.”

“Gossip is the Devil's tongue working overtime. But Joe, I was already an outcast the moment I refused to marry Mr. Purvis. And he still comes around because he is a very persistent man. He vows that he will take none other than me for his next wife.”

“
Next?
Oh, yeah, I forgot the Mormon men sometimes take a lot of wives. Some Indians do that, too, you know.” Joe grinned. “As for me, I couldn't handle more than one woman. No offense, ma'am, but they can be a powerful bother and distraction at times.”

Ellen laughed out loud. “Was your beloved Fiona a ‘bother and distraction'?”

Joe saw the trap he'd stepped in, but he was caught and had no choice but to be honest. “I reckon she was a big distraction and my downfall on that wagon train. You see, I was with her the night that Indians came and stole a few of our horses.”

“You were out walking and talking.”

“We were doing a little
more'n
that,” Joe confessed, feeling the heat rise in his cheeks. “But the long and short of it is that those horse-thievin' Indians killed poor Tommy Kramer and Fiona's arm got broken. So that's why they fired me and found another wagon master.”

“I see.”

“I didn't argue any about gettin' fired. I deserved it and I'm ashamed about it. But most of all, I'm ashamed for what I did to Fiona.”

“You mean putting her in a motherly way.”

“Sure, and us not being married.”

Ellen nodded. “I hope that you find her and your child on the Comstock Lode and that everything turns out well for you as a family. But . . . .”

“But what, ma'am?”

“But she might have remarried, Joe. Or is engaged or fallen ill and died. There are many things that could have happened since you saw her. And most likely of all, she may hate you for what she had to go through.”

“Hate me?”

“Yes,” Ellen said. “Hate you. So be prepared for that.”

Joe expelled a deep breath. “I never thought about that hate thing.”

“Well, it's probably not going to be the case so don't worry about it. All I'm trying to say is that you need to be prepared for some disappointment. Life just never turns out exactly the way we want . . . or expect.”

“Yes, ma'am,” Joe said as the dark clouds settled in his mind. “But right now, all I can do is to get well again and then collect that lumber on the mountainside.”

“That's right, Joe.”

She was about to say more, but suddenly a blocky man appeared in the doorway. Ellen Johnson turned and, in the half-light, Joe could see what he was sure was pure fear pass across her face.

Joe's eyes jumped to the big, bearded man blocking the doorway, and he knew without asking that this was Ellen's overbearing and determined suitor, Elder Eli Purvis.

“Ellen, am I interrupting something
personal
?” the man challenged.

Ellen stood up straight and lifted her chin. “Of course not, Mr. Purvis. We were just discussing . . . the weather.”

“Ah, I see. Well, the weather is fine as anyone can see, but how is your friend who collects bloody scalps?”

She took a deep breath and replied, “Mr. Moss is mending.”

“Slowly,” Purvis said. “Too slowly.”

Ellen's cheeks reddened and she snapped, “Mr. Moss has a broken hip and a crushed foot in addition to some very serious cuts and bruises. And he is not a young man, Mr. Purvis.”

“No, I can see that.”

Purvis was in his mid-fifties. Big and strong with chin whiskers and thin gray strands of hair stretched across an otherwise bald head. His brows were black and bushy, and he wore heavy boots and baggy pants with a heavy canvas coat smeared with dirt and manure. His hat was black and flat-brimmed, and Joe's overall impression was that he was above all else a self-important and humorless man.

Joe pushed himself up in his bed and glared at the intruder. Purvis had staked out the fact that they were not going to be on friendly terms. He'd made that more than plain from his sharp words and expression of disgust and disapproval. Joe saw no reason to try to be cordial with this man who was causing Ellen Johnson so much fear and worry.

“You'd be Mrs. Johnson's neighbor,” Joe said. “I'd be Joe Moss.”

Purvis didn't bother to move any closer, much less shake hands. “So how did you happen to run your team off the side of that cliff, Joe? Were you drunk or just not paying attention?”

Joe's jaw clenched, and it was all that he could do to remain civil out of respect to Mrs. Johnson. “I was run off the road by a freighter comin' up the grade.”

“Oh, really? Well, that's a first. I took four strong men down there and dragged you and what stock survived out of that canyon. Took us a full day away from our farms and own chores.”

“I'm grateful to you for that,” Joe said grudgingly.

“And in repayment,” Purvis said, “we are willing to take that broken and splintered lumber.”

“I'm planning on bringing that lumber back up to the road and taking it on to sell in Carson City or on the Comstock Lode.”

Purvis didn't like that even a little bit. His jaw clenched and he said, “Then how will you repay our community for the loss of our time?”

Joe reckoned he should have seen that one coming. Charity toward strangers might exist in Mrs. Johnson, but it sure didn't in the rest of these people toward an outsider. “Will twenty dollars do?”

He could see that Purvis was surprised by the sum. Men worked in the nearby Comstock deep mines earning three dollars for a ten-hour day, and farm labor often brought only a dollar a day, while Joe had just offered four dollars each to the five men.

“It will do,” Purvis said. “Providing it is payment in gold and not federal dollars.”

“It will be.”

There was a long silence, and then Purvis asked, “Are you a man of God?”

“I reckon God made us all,” Joe said. “And that includes Indians.”

The man's eyes widened. “Heathens are not Christians and they'll go to hell.”

“Judge not lest ye be judged, Eli Purvis,” Ellen said, coming between them. “And now, I have my own chores to do if we're finished talking.”

Purvis was being dismissed, and he didn't like that from how his eyes tightened at the corners. He gave Joe one last withering look of disdain, and then turned and walked away.

“I can see why you'd not want to marry that man,” Joe said. “How many wives does he already have?”

“Three.”

“I feel damned sorry for 'em,” Joe told her. “You'd be better off stayin' single than marrying a man like that.”

“I know, but I might not have a choice in the matter for much longer.”

Joe blinked. “Why not? You and your husband owned this farm.”

“That's true,” she replied, “but without help and if no one will buy my eggs, milk, or vegetables, I'll have no income and they'll force me under.”

Joe didn't doubt that she was telling the truth. “Well,” he said, “I'll help you starting tomorrow. I'm about ready to get out of this shed and move about. My hip feels half-mended and my foot is a trial, but I can use a crutch and still get from here to there. Say, you wouldn't have a little whiskey to ease the pain of it would you, Mrs. Johnson?”

She almost smiled. “Joe, you
know
that I wouldn't.”

“Yeah,” he said, trying to hide his disappointment. “But it never hurts to ask, ma'am.”

When Mrs. Johnson was gone, Joe dressed and eased himself out of the bed. His broken hip hurt so bad he nearly passed out, and he could only put a little weight on his foot, which was still swollen and purple.

But he'd had his fill of lying in bed as an invalid. He would get to work and do whatever he could to help this woman, and he'd not once complain or whine about it, either. Because as long as Joe Moss was around, Eli Purvis might as well suck rope rather than think he could bully or force Ellen Johnson into becoming his fourth wife.

I
N HIS FIRST few weeks upright, Joe had to rest more than he worked. But he did his best to help Mrs. Johnson, and he could split firewood pretty well standing or seated on a log. Within days of his decision to get up and get to work, Joe had made a crutch from an aspen and Ellen padded the crosspiece that went under his arm with a piece of lamb's wool. She did that despite Joe's protests that he didn't need things to be sissified.

The Johnson farm was 160 acres of good, flat land, and it was cross-fenced and irrigated from a gushing stream that came down from a canyon and ran right through Genoa. The stream was used by every family and the amount of water was fairly allocated. Mrs. Johnson, for example, was allowed all the water that she could use for eight hours every fifth day. When it was her turn to use water, Joe and Ellen would go out into the fields and open and close wooden gates flooding the farm's ditches and pastures.

“Mighty good water and grass,” Joe said one fine afternoon as they watched the mountain water pour across one of the pastures. “This is a fine piece of land, Mrs. Johnson. You ought to grow corn and more hay like your neighbor Purvis.”

“He's got a lot of help given his wives and all those children,” she said. “It's all that I can do to raise a big garden, feed the livestock, pigs, geese, and chickens.”

“I suppose that you could sell this place for a good amount of money.”

“No, I could not,” she countered. “Only a Mormon would buy here. Anyone else would be frozen out and their water would be stopped. And no Mormon will buy from me because it is understood that I am to be Eli Purvis's wife.”

Joe's mouth turned down at the corners. “God didn't give this land to the Mormons or anyone to hold forever. The Paiutes had it first, and long after Purvis and the rest of us are dust, this land will be used by others. We can't really own land, ma'am; we can only just take care of it while passin' through life.”