Part 12 (1/2)

”Don't cry, Bobby! Please don't cry!”

”It--it was awful!”

”I know, but would you want Clover to suffer? Pete did the right thing.

If I'd have been here, I'd have done it myself.”

Panting hard, Tad's dog came around a corner of the house and threw himself down in the shade. Tad followed, whittling on a stick with his knife and kicking at the shavings as they fell. He looked at his sobbing sister in her father's arms and scornfully expressed what he felt was a distinct superiority of all male creatures over all female.

”Huh! Cryin' about an old cow!”

Joe felt an immediate relief. He did not know how to comfort a broken-hearted girl, but at this moment he did know what to do about this freckle-faced son of his. He was relieved because Tad had provided him with an outlet for his pent-up feelings.

”Will you get out of here,” he roared, ”before I cut a hickory switch and use it to tan your ornery hide!”

Tad said, ”I ain't doin' anything.”

”You're walking around with a knife in your hand for one thing! For another you're getting too big for your britches! Now beat it, and if I catch you using a knife that way again I'll take it away from you until you show some sense!”

Head up, shoulders squared, Tad walked back around the house and Mike rose to follow him. Joe gulped, penitent because he had spoken harshly to Tad. But in some fas.h.i.+on that he did not understand the spell was broken and Barbara's near hysteria was no more. She pushed herself away from him, wiped her eyes with a handkerchief, and smiled tremulously.

Joe had a sudden inspiration.

”Look, honey, go tell your mother that I have some things to say to her as soon as I've put the mule away. You might wait for me too. It's sort of a family matter.”

For a second she said nothing and Joe had a momentary little panic because he thought she was going to start crying again. Instead, she repeated her smile.

”I'll tell her, Daddy.”

She walked away and Joe was happy again. His master coup had been effective, and by sending Barbara to Emma he had at least taken her mind from Clover's tragedy. Barbara made pets of all the farm animals, and hers was a deep sensitivity. She could bear to see nothing she liked hurt. At pig-killing time, which was always in the fall, she made an excuse to visit her bosom friend, Marcia Geragty, and invariably she stayed away until everything was over. Though she was a willing and hard worker, n.o.body could count on her to help at the butchering--naturally the men always did the slaughtering--and sometimes Joe worried about her because obviously Barbara was destined to be a farmer's wife. As such, she would have to know a farm wife's tasks and taking care of meat was one of them. Joe knew another period of doubt and indecision.

Above all, he wanted for his children more and better opportunities than he had ever known. But, though Tad would be wild with joy at the very thought, was the west really a place for Barbara? She had grown up here; all her friends were here. Was it right to uproot her, to tear her away from everything she knew and loved? And--Joe still thought of her as very fragile--could she bear up under the hards.h.i.+ps of such a long journey? Would the west offer her anything to compensate for what she would lose by leaving Missouri? Joe comforted himself with the thought that Barbara had a mind of her own. She could be counted on to express her sincere convictions at the forthcoming family conference.

Joe wrinkled his brow. He'd had his setbacks, but none comparable to the recent disasters. A whole crop ruined and a valuable cow lost. It seemed that the land over which he had labored so hard had rejected him completely. He knew a sudden wild urge to be away, to start immediately for Oregon where a man was his own master. Joe led the mule around a corner of the house and saw Tad leaning against the building.

Joe stopped and said gruffly, ”Sorry I yelled, Tad.”

Tad shrugged. ”Clover's leg was broke. I saw it myself. What could you do except shoot her?”

”Nothing,” Joe admitted, ”but womenfolk don't--”

”Don't what?” Tad asked.

”They don't understand some things.”

It was a lame explanation and one which, Joe felt, did not suffice.

Women understood most things, and Joe knew of men who had died in agony while other men stood uncaringly near. That being the way things were sometimes, there was something mighty wholesome about anyone at all who could shed genuine tears over a dead cow. But Joe could think of nothing else to say.

Tad asked too casually, ”What'd you find out this morning, Pa?”

Without answering immediately, Joe put the mule in the pasture, slipped her bridle off, and closed the gate. As far as he knew, none of the children even suspected that he and Emma were planning to go west. But Tad had a way of finding out much that he was not supposed to know; perhaps he had been lying awake, listening, the night Joe returned from Tenney's and talked with Emma. He turned to Tad and said,

”You come along and see.”