Page 140 of Conveniently Wed
The Bryant Ranch was up to about fifty head of cattle now. Not anything like the big ranches he’d heard about in Texas, but their little herd was growing. If at least most of the calves came with no problems this year, they would have close to seventy head.
How would he take care of seventy head of cattle by himself, now that Abel was gone?
The now-familiar ache cut his breath short. Scenes from the horrific grizzly attack that had killed his brother the week before flashed through Gideon’s mind. He scrubbed a hand down his face to clear them. He couldn’t get bogged down in this now. He missed his baby brother with a physical pain, but that wouldn’t bring him back. It hadn’t brought any of the others back.
He needed to deal with reality for now. He could manage the work, at least for the summer months. He may need some help with the haying, but that would be it. Especially with Miriam taking on most of their brother’s chores around the cabin.
His baby sister had always worked her fair share. Like when Pa died. She had shouldered much more than her half of the housework. Then when Ma took sick and passed, too, Miriam took over everything.
As much as he hated to admit, he’d married Jane partly in hopes she would help his sister with the house and garden and cooking.
Jane had tried, really she had. Deep down, though, he knew she’d hated mountain life. She was afraid of it, with the harsh winters and wild animals constantly lurking about. And maybe her fear had been well-founded, because it was one of those wild animals that finally took her life. Then Miriam had gone back to running the household on her lonesome.
He picked up his ax and headed back to the little barn he’d built in the valley to store hay and animal supplies. He needed to check on the broodmares, too. The gray mare looked to be within a week or two of foaling.
He now understood how Miriam must have felt for all those years, shouldering the load by herself. Abel had always been his partner with the ranch. The two of them had worked together so long, they could read each other’s minds, not to mention reading the weather and the animal signs.
Abel was the one who’d first found the gold on their property, too. They never mined much of it, just enough to restock supplies every few years. The gold allowed them to keep most of the cattle and build up the herd. Someday, they would have a vast herd with hundreds or even thousands of cattle. Someday.
Which led him back to his original conundrum—what would he do when the winter months hit again? It would be a challenge, for sure, to keep the cattle watered and with enough food in the deep snow. With no garden through the winter to supplement their food supply, he would need to hunt more. The constant snow on the ground made work harder and slower.
Should he start panning for gold again as soon as the weather warmed? He’d probably need the dust to pay a hired hand. But if he was mining, he really would need someone else to help with the cattle and haying. “Grrrrr…”
The dog at his feet whined and inched forward on his belly until almost touching Gideon’s boot. He reached down to scratch behind a black ear.
“Sorry, boy. Didn’t mean to say that out loud.”
Drifter accepted the apology by licking Gideon’s sleeve. At least he had one friend out here to help him.
Every muscle, bone, and joint hurt beyond what Leah had ever felt, as she half-climbed, half-fell from the wagon. She dragged herself toward the tree line bordering the road in search of a little privacy.
“Jest don’t wander off too far. An’ can ya bring some logs and sticks back fer the fire?” Ol’ Mose called as he started pulling things from the wagon. Riding for ten long hours in the jolting, creaking wagon didn’t seem to bother him in the least.
Leah nodded, her need too great to stop as she stumbled through the trees until she was a safe distance from the campsite. She needed a necessary house, but of course there wasn’t anything like that in this primitive wilderness.
On her way back to the wagon, Leah picked up some logs as Ol’ Mose had requested. With her arms loaded down and her hair mussed from the pull of branches, she stepped through the tree line into the clearing. Ol’ Mose was hunkered on his hands and knees over a pile of sticks. He appeared to be blowing into them as a thin stream of smoke curled up into the sky.
Leah dropped the logs in a heap nearby, and Ol’ Mose leaned back to reveal a small flame. He surveyed the logs she’d brought, then looked up at Leah with a twinkle in his faded brown eyes.
“You ain’t never picked out logs fer a fire ‘afore, have ye now?”
Her face grew warm. Was it that obvious? “No, sir.”
“Well, then.” He rose to his feet more gracefully than Leah would have expected for a man his age, then stepped in front of the heap at her feet. “See here.” He picked up some small sticks. “These are good for when the fire’s little. They’re nice and dry and small, so they’ll catch easy-like. That one over there is toowet to use for anythin’. An’ the big’uns there.” He pointed to the thick round logs she’d struggled with. “These have a few strikes against ‘em. They’re green so it’ll be hard for ‘em to catch, they won’t put out much heat, and they’ll smoke like the devil ‘imself is sittin’ with us.”
Leah was trying to follow him, but he’d lost her when he said the wood was green. Those logs were as gray in color as the sky before a storm. Was Ol’ Mose color-blind? It was possible.
Suddenly, the old man let out a cackle and slapped his thigh. “I bet I stumped ya when I said the wood was green, didn’t I? That means it was just growin’ and didn’t have a chance to dry out yet. The dry stuff is what we want fer a fire. Oak and maple make good fires, not too many sparks but plenty o’ coals for cookin’.”
Leah nodded, locking that tidbit in the back of her mind for later. Thankfully, he didn’t require much from her as he unhitched the mules and grabbed a few items from the wagon. But dread settled in when he returned with two leaf- and dirt-covered blankets.
“Fer your bed,” he said, tossing them at her.
She could do this, she just had to set her mind to it. Still, the thought of her goose-down mattress back in Richmond flickered unbidden through her mind.
When the old fellow began cooking their dinner, she tried to pay close attention. She’d loved the times as a girl when she could sneak down to the kitchen to help their cook with dinner or special treats. Cooking and baking had always fascinated her, although she’d rarely been allowed to practice. Thankfully, Mose liked to chatter, and he talked through everything he was doing.
“We’ll get these beans a’started right off, since they take the longest to cook. Then, once some o’ the coals get white hot, I’ll mix up cornbread in yonder skillet and we’ll have a real feast onour hands.” He apparently believed his statement, too, from the grin showing in his eyes. “Ere you a good cook, Miz Townsend?”
