Rose(11)
“Your father?”
The hesitation was barely perceptible. “We think he was killed in Georgia, not too long after the battle for Atlanta.”
Rose didn’t know how to respond. The tone of George’s voice exhibited such a mixture of emotions—cold observation and throbbing anger—she thought it better to ask no questions.
The ranch did nothing to support her flagging spirits. It consisted of a house, which at a distance appeared to be made up of two very large rooms with a dog trot in between, and two corrals. A blooded bull occupied one.
George followed her gaze. “A family in Alabama gave us the bull for helping them out. Jeff and I kept him between us all the way to make sure nobody would steal him. At night we slept in shifts. The steers we can breed from him can make us rich.”
As they drew closer, the house looked even more pitiful. Bedraggled chickens scratching about for a meager existence didn’t improve the landscape. A milk cow grazed a hundred yards from the house. Her sorry condition made her fit right in with the setting. A person could starve and die out here and no one would ever know.
“I’m afraid things have been let go since Ma died. The twins have been too busy with the herd, and the young ones never mind a mess.”
“Young ones? You said seven men.”
“We’re only six just now. No one’s heard from Madison.” His voice faltered, but only for a moment. “The twins are seventeen, Tyler’s thirteen, and Zac is almost seven.”
“He’s practically a baby,” Rose exclaimed, her sympathy aroused for any child forced to grow up in this barren wilderness.
“Don’t tell him that,” George cautioned, the first smile Rose had seen in hours fracturing his solemn expression. “He thinks he’s as grown as the rest of us.”
“There’s still one more.”
“Jeff.”
He said the name as if he deserved an entire chapter to himself, as if all rules no longer applied.
“Jeff lost his arm at Gettysburg. A minié ball shattered his elbow.”
Why did each word feel like an accusation hurled at her? He hadn’t looked at her, she could hear no condemnation in his voice, but she felt it nonetheless.
“He spent the rest of the war in a prison camp.”
Rose couldn’t think of anything to say.
“He pretends to have accepted it, but he hasn’t. Don’t refer to your father’s being a hero in the union Army.”
“You mean to keep it a secret?”
“I don’t see how mentioning it would cause anything but trouble.”
Rose had to agree, but she hated lies, even lies she hadn’t told. “Tell me about the others.”
“I hardly know them. Zac was a baby when I left, Tyler only eight.”
“And the twins?”
“They’ve grown into young men I hardly understand.”
No one came from the house to greet them. The silence of the midafternoon grew oppressive. The enervating heat of summer was still a month away, but Rose felt as if she had stepped into a still life. Nothing moved. Nothing made any sound.
George dismounted, but she couldn’t move her lower body. She couldn’t even feel her legs.
Like a gentleman, he helped her down. He went through all the motions, said all the words, but there was no warmth in his touch. She leaned on him at first, then decided she preferred her horse. He might kick her, but at least it would be a sign of emotion.
“We sleep on this side,” George said, pointing to the left half of the house as she worked some kinks out of her muscles. “This is the kitchen.”
She could tell that from the chimney. The yard, if the area around the house could have been dignified by such a name, hadn’t been swept in weeks. Rose privately wondered if it had ever been swept. In addition to being the place where they kept their saddles and harnesses, the dog trot seemed to be the place where they threw everything that had lost its use. The windows contained real glass, but Rose doubted she would be able to distinguish much more than daylight and dark until they were cleaned.
Then George opened the door to the kitchen.
Rose’s knees nearly buckled under her. The room was in such a state it was scarcely recognizable as a kitchen. A huge iron stove stood piled high with every pot in the house, each covered with remnants of food. Dirty plates and glasses covered the table. On closer inspection Rose discovered that most were chipped and cheap, with a few extremely fine china and crystal pieces. Around the rough board table stood eight ladder-back chairs, slats cracked, rungs worn from use, and cane seats coming loose.
Thrown together, cheek by jowl, were wooden buckets, a crusted Rochester brass hanging lamp, a battered coffeepot, a crude worktable, and a pile of discarded tin cans. The curtains were gray with grease and dust. The woodbox contained little besides splinters.