When the Wind Blows (11 page)

Gurley rose from his chair and came around the desk to stand in front of the old woman. He looked down at her and let his face settle into its most serious expression. “I don’t know what you’re trying to say, Miss Edna, but to me it sounds almost like a threat. If it is, let me tell you that no matter what happens now, I’ll remember your words. As for any legal action you may be contemplating, I’d think twice, if I were you. You’d have to sue Diana, and I should think that any lawyer she retained would advise her to sue you right back. You’re not a young woman, Miss Edna, and everybody in Amberton knows you’re—what?” He paused for a moment, then flung the word in her face. “Eccentric?”

Edna Amber rose out of her chair, her eyes blazing with fury.

“How dare you!” she demanded, but the marshal only met her gaze with a calm he had practiced for years.

“You came to me for advice, Miss Edna,” he said, “I’m giving it to you. I know you resent suddenly having a child in your home. You’re used to having Diana’s attention all to yourself, and now you won’t have that anymore. As far as I’m concerned, you’re welcome to try to convince Diana to give up the child. But I wouldn’t try to take it to court, Miss Edna, Instead I’d try to get used to things the way they are.
Life does not always go the way we want it to. Not even for you.”

With tension crackling between them, the marshal and the old woman silently challenged each other. In the end it was Dan Gurley who looked away, shifting his attention to the bright day outside.

“It’s summer, Miss Edna,” he said conversationally, as if a moment before he hadn’t been locked in wordless battle with her. “It’s going to be hot this year. Hot and dry. Folks are going to be edgy. Seems to me like the best thing we can all do is try to stay quiet, try to get by.”

“It’s a summer like all others, Daniel,” Edna replied. “And I intended to spend it like all others. At home, alone with my daughter. Perhaps I still shall.” She picked up her purse and left Dan Gurley’s office. He heard the door close behind her, but remained by the window until he saw her move slowly down the steps of the building and climb into her car. Only when the Cadillac had pulled away from the curb did he turn back to his empty office.

   Diana led Christie into the shed above the root cellar. Lining the walls were sacks of food, and she carefully began explaining to the little girl what each of them was for, and how much of it was to be given to the chickens each day. But even as she talked, she wondered with half her mind where her mother had gone and why she had gone alone.

There had been a moment of panic when she saw the Cadillac leave the garage, but then, as Edna proceeded steadily along the road toward Amberton, the panic had lifted, leaving only a vague sense of unease.

She should have felt relieved. It had been years since her mother had gone anywhere alone, and Diana knew that she should be happy that her mother was at last doing something for herself. But deep inside, she
also knew that the reason for Edna’s trip had to do with herself. Herself and Christie.

“Do they really eat gravel?”

Christie’s question interrupted her thoughts. “It’s for their gizzards,” she explained. “They need the gravel to help them digest the seed they eat.”

“Yuck.” Christie’s face creased in disgust. She looked at the various bags, sure she would never remember what all of it was. What if she fed the chickens the wrong food? Would Diana be angry with her? She’d have to be very careful not to make a mistake. But what if she did? The question nagged at her, worried her. Life was so different now. Everything was new, and there was so much she didn’t understand. “Can’t we go see the horses now?” she begged. She understood horses and liked them a lot better than chickens.

Diana nodded and began securing the latch on the shed door. “Always be
sure this
door is closed tight. Chickens are stupid, but they know where their food is, and if they get
in
here, they’ll eat themselves to death.” Christie nodded solemnly, and they started across to the stable. “Do you know how to ride?”

Christie bobbed her head eagerly. “I took lessons in Chicago, but it was with an English saddle.”

“Then we’ll start you out with Hayburner until you get used to Western. He’s big, but he’s gentle. I think if you fell off him, he’d try to pick you up and put you back on.”

They went into the barn. In the second stall an immense dappled gray whinnied at them, his head hanging over the gate as he watched them move toward him.

“Is that him?”

“That’s him. Do you want to pet him?”

Christie, happy to be back on familiar ground, let go of Diana’s hand and approached the horse. “Hi,
Hayburner.” She reached up and scratched the horse’s neck. “My name’s Christie. You’re going to take me everywhere, and we’re going to be best friends. How do you like that?”

Hayburner pawed the floor of his stall, and his tongue emerged from his mouth to investigate Christie’s hand for a possible sugar cube. “He likes me!” Christie cried. “Aunt Diana, he likes me!”

Diana grinned. “He likes everybody, sweetheart. I think he’s some kind of a freak—he looks like a horse, but he acts like a dog.”

“He does not!” Christie protested. She opened the stall and went in. Hayburner backed up to make room for her, then began nuzzling her. Diana quickly moved forward.

“Be careful—he’s not used to you yet.”

“Yes he is. See? He loves me! Can we put a saddle on him? Right now? Please?”

Diana hesitated, disturbed by the look of pure joy on Christie’s face. She cast about in her mind for an excuse but found none. “Why not?” she said. “Come on—you might as well learn the tack room.”

They went to the back of the barn and began sorting through the various saddles.

“What about this one?” Christie asked. She pulled a piece of canvas off a saddle that stood on a rack in the corner. Though it was obviously old, it was polished brightly and smelled of saddle soap. Diana frowned slightly, then shrugged.

“All right—it was my saddle when I was a little girl—it’ll be perfect.” They chose a blanket and a bridle, then Diana picked up the saddle. Returning to Hayburner’s stall, they began saddling the horse, while the big gray continued snuffling at Christie. When they were done, Christie led him outside.

“Do you need a block?” Diana asked. She started toward the barn, but Christie was already scrambling
into the saddle. “Let me help you,” Diana cried, hurrying toward the struggling child.

“I can do it,” Christie protested. “I’m not a baby, and my teacher in Chicago said you have to be able to get on a horse by yourself.”

The words stung Diana, and she watched helplessly as Christie put her left foot in the stirrup and swung herself up onto Hayburner’s back. The horse craned his neck to peer up at her, then began walking slowly around the corral. Christie whispered to him, squeezed him with her knees, and he broke into a trot.

“How’s it feel?” Diana called.

“It’s neat! It’s different than the saddle I used in Chicago. Wider.”

“Easier on the horse, harder on you.”

Diana climbed up onto the top rail of the corral and watched as Hayburner trotted around the corral once more. Christie, she realized, rode better than she had expected. In a way, Diana felt disappointed—she had hoped to be able to teach Christie riding, just as her mother had taught her. Then, as she watched the girl and the horse moving together so naturally, she began to wonder if she’d made a mistake. In her heart, she could feel the horse coming between herself and Christie.

“That’s enough,” she suddenly called. Christie looked up, startled by the anger she heard in Diana’s voice, and quickly reined Hayburner to a halt next to Diana.

“Can Hayburner be my horse, Aunt Diana?” she asked. “Please? I love him, and I can tell he loves me, too.”

Diana was silent for a moment, her emotions in upheaval. Finally, reluctantly, she nodded. “All right,” she said slowly. “He’s yours. But I won’t have you getting too attached to him, do you understand? He’s old, and he could die.”

The happy smile faded from Christie’s face. “Why would he die?” she asked.

When she spoke again, Diana’s voice was muted, and Christie had to strain to hear the words.

“Because that’s what happens,” Diana said. “You love things, and they get taken away from you. Or they die.”

As the words sank in, Christie’s eyes brimmed with tears, and she patted the horse gently.

“You won’t die, will you, Hayburner?” she whispered to him. The horse pawed at the ground nervously and tossed its head, then started toward the barn.

As she watched them go Diana remembered the words she had just uttered and wondered where they had come from. Surely not from herself. They were such cruel words, and she had seen the hurt they had caused Christie.

And yet she had said them.

She climbed slowly off the corral fence and started toward the house, still wondering what the words had meant.

They had come from somewhere deep within herself, from a part of her mind that she didn’t like to think about.

The part where she buried things.

But somehow the things never stayed buried. Instead they kept coming back, demanding to be acted upon.

She went into the kitchen, letting the door slam behind her as she had slammed doors on so much of her past.

7

Kim Sandler and Susan Gillespie scuffed along the road, then veered into the field that lay between them and the Ambers’ corral.

“Wow.” Kim’s voice was awed, and Susan, who had stooped down to investigate a rock, looked up. Kim was pointing ahead. “She’s got a horse!”

Susan stood up and gazed across the field to see Christie leading Hayburner around the corral. “Do you think she’ll let us ride it?” Susan asked. They broke into a run, entranced by the possibilities of access to a horse. Arriving at the corral, they scrambled up the rails, and Christie brought Hayburner to a halt next to them. The big gray gazed placidly at the two newcomers. Kim put out a hand to pat him, and the horse snuffled affably.

“Is he yours?” Susan asked.

“I guess so,” Christie began uncertainly. “His name’s Hayburner, and Aunt Diana gave him to me this morning. Isn’t he neat?”

“Gave
him to you?” Kim demanded suspiciously. “To keep? I mean, could you sell him if you wanted to?”

“Why would I want to?” Christie countered.

“I didn’t mean you’d
want
to. I mean, is he really yours, or do you just get to ride him?”

Christie glanced at the house nervously, remembering Diana’s strange words. “He’s mine,” she insisted.
“Anyway, that’s what Aunt Diana said.” Then, as if to prove the horse was really hers, she turned to Susan. “Want to ride him with me?”

Susan nodded eagerly, and after Christie had mounted, she scrambled from the corral fence onto the horse, her wiry body perched behind Christie. As Kim looked on enviously Hayburner obligingly trotted around the corral.

“Can he gallop?” Susan asked, her arms gripping Christie’s waist. Christie nodded. “Well, make him, Susan begged.

“There isn’t enough room in here,” Christie told her. She reined the horse to a halt, and Susan clambered back onto the fence. As Kim was about to take her place the three girls heard a voice calling from the house.

“Christie? Christie!”

All three of them turned toward the sound and saw Diana hurrying toward them. Instinctively Kim settled back onto the fence.

Approaching the corral, Diana ignored the two other girls, her attention focused on Christie. “What are you doing?” she asked, her voice edged with annoyance.

“Just giving Susan and Kim a ride,” Christie replied, wondering what mistake she had made now.

“You barely know how to ride him yourself,” Diana protested. “You could get hurt.”

“Hayburner wouldn’t hurt anybody,” Christie said. “He didn’t mind. He likes us.”

“He really does, Miss Diana,” Susan added. For the first time Diana shifted her attention to the two other girls.

“What are you doing out here?” she demanded.

Susan and Kim exchanged a worried look, then Kim spoke for both of them. “We just came to see Christie.”

“
To see Christie.”
The words echoed in Diana’s ears
and anger surged through her. Her first impulse was to order them off the property. And yet, even as she was gripped by the same surge of jealousy she’d felt earlier as she’d watched Christie ride, the voice of reason whispered to her. If she sent them away, what would they tell their parents? That she was crazy? That she wouldn’t let anyone see Christie? She made herself calm down, and forced a smile. “Would you like something to drink?” she offered. “Some lemonade, maybe?”

Again Kim and Susan exchanged a look. “We were going for a hike,” Susan explained. “We thought maybe Christie could come with us.”

“Can I?” Christie asked.

Again the strange anger swept through Diana, but this time she didn’t try to overcome it. “No,” she said. Then, feeling compelled to provide a reason for her refusal, she went on. “Juan’s coming, and we’re going to ride fence with him.”

Christie slid off Hayburner and dug her toe into the ground. “Do I have to?” she asked.