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back on the trail. They took him along to lead the next herd north.
Barnie's adjoining claim served as an outlying camp from which he worked,
checking on the cattle in his area.
The first winter was cold and blustery, with subzero temperatures common and
days of heavy snowfall, with the first flakes falling in early October. It
wasn't a severe winter by Montana standards. At Christmastime Mary and Ely
came for a holiday dinner. Ely read the bethlehem story from the Bible, then
Woolie played Christmas carols on his harmonica and they all sang.
When Lorna's time drew near the first of April, Mary came to stay at the cabin
and serve as midwife. Despite all the frightening stories Lorna had heard
about childbirth in the wilds, she had an easy time of it. Benteen held their
newborn son, Webb Matthew Calder, that first day of his life, and on the next,
Benteen rode off with the rest of the men to start the spring roundup.
Bridle chains clanked as the small group of riders approached the collection
of crude buildings forming the ranch's headquarters on an early May afternoon.
They sat loosely in the saddle, swaying slightly with the rhythm of their
trotting horses. The stirrups were long, so there was hardly any bend in the
knee.
Haggard lines were drawn across Benteen's bronzed features from the brutally
long days of the roundup, but his eyes remained keen and restless. Both winter
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losses and calving losses had been minimal, less than he had expected.
When he saw Lorna standing in front of the cabin holding the baby in her arms
and waving eagerly to him, the sight revived his acute hungers. Her hair
gleamed rich brown in the sunlight, and her parted lips were even and red
against her smooth complexion. It warmed him like a fire in the night or a
spring flower pushing its way through the crust of melting snow. It was
something in her eyes or her lips or the turn of her body that churned the
depths of his emotions. The heat of something rash and timeless burned him,
the kind of thing that would make a man kill if he had to.
He swung out of the saddle and dropped the reins. For the moment, his hands
stayed at his side as Benteen faced her and his son. The faint scent of her
hair lifted to him. Her dark eyes were shining as they returned his steady
look. There was a powerful hint of fire in her slightly pursed lips, a
sweetness in them for a man.
Her voice, when she spoke, did not address itself to him but to the nearly
month-old boy-child with its mass of black-down hair. "Didn't I tell you Daddy
would come home today, Webb?"
All his muscles were drawn together, poised for movement. With her words, the
needs Benteen held in check were released. His arm hooked itself around her
waist, discovering its slimness through the heavy shawl, and drew her into
him. He bent and kissed her. A fine sweat broke out on him as he felt the
gathering insistence of her response.
Benteen knew the pressure of his arms and his mouth were too strong, too
assertive of his rights to her. He broke it off, taking a step back, aware of
the vibration all the way through him. There was something uncertain and
questioning about the way she looked at him. Her lips were still parted and he
looked to see if he'd left the print of his roughness on them. Maybe the
impulses that drove him were dirt common.
He swung his attention to the baby and caught the little fist flailing the
air. A smile edged his mouth as Benteen tried to curl the tiny fingers around
his forefinger.
"How did it go?" Lorna asked, and he knew she meant the roundup.
"Good. He doesn't look like the squawling red-faced baby I held." Benteen took
his son from her arms to hold him again.
"You have been gone awhile," she reminded him.
Cradling the infant in one arm, Benteen turned and scooped up the reins to his
horse, looping them over its neck. He stepped a foot into the stirrup and
swung into the saddle, all in one fluid motion. With his weight shifted to the
back of the saddle, he set his baby son in front of him and spread his hand
across Webb's chest and stomach to hold him firmly in place.
"Benteen, what do you think you're doing?" Lorna hurried to the side of his
horse.
"I'm taking Webb for his first ride."
"But he isn't even a month old yet," she protested.
"He has to start sometime if he's going to make a living off a horse like his
old man," Benteen stated, and walked the horse out, aware that Lorna was
following anxiously.
He kept the baby's head supported with his body and held his mount at a slow
walk. When he'd been three years old, he'd been riding a full-grown horse
without the assistance of an adult, so his father told him. Benteen saw no
harm in starting his own son out early.
When he reached the crude barn-shed and dismounted, the cowboys gathered
around the infant like moths to a flame. In their profession, it was rare to
have any contact with babies or youngsters. Lorna stood back amused to watch
these hard, rough-talking men cooing and talking silly talk to the baby in
Benteen's arms. Woolie insisted Webb had the hands of a first-rate roper,
while Bob Vernon claimed he could see the intelligence in the baby's eyes,
although they were closed at the time.
Lorna stepped forward to take her son when Webb started fussing. Hats were
swept off the cowboys heads as they made room for her. The birth of the child
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had elevated her status from merely woman to mother. They treated her like a
Madonna.
"There's coffee on the stove," she said to Benteen when he placed his son into
her arms.
"I'll be there as soon as I've seen to my horse," he promised.
There was something in him that made him take longer at the task than he had
to, as if he needed to deny himself the thing he wanted most. When he lifted
the latch to the log door and pushed it open, Benteen forced an indifference
to his face. The cabin appeared empty as he stepped inside. His searching
glance noticed the coffeepot sitting on the iron stove that heated the small
space and cooked their food.
"Lorna?"
"I'll be there in a minute." Her voice came from behind the cloth wall.
His footsteps were drawn to it. When he lifted it, he saw her sitting on their
bed nursing their son. Her eyes widened to show him a startled expression.
Color ran richly across her cheeks as she started to interrupt the haby's
feeding.
"Don't stop if he's still hungry." Benteen stepped around the curtain and let
it fall into place behind him.
"He's very greedy sometimes," Lorna murmured.
Benteen looked down on the pair. The front of her dress was unbuttoned to free
the taut fullness of her breast. Little fists pushed at its roundness while a
small mouth sucked vigorously on the nipple.
"I didn't think I could stand calmly by while another male enjoyed the
ripeness of your breasts," Benteen commented.
"He's nursing," Lorna murmured. "It's hardly the same.,,
"I should hope not," he said dryly, and lowered himself to sit on the edge of
the bed beside them.
His hand reached to stroke his son's head, then traced a finger over the swell
of her breast. He unfastened a few more buttons and pushed aside her dress to
expose both breasts. She breathed in when he cupped the weight of her other
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| Cytat |
Dobre pomysły nie mają przeszłości, mają tylko przyszłość. Robert Mallet
De minimis - o najmniejszych rzeczach.
Dobroć jest ważniejsza niż mądrość, a uznanie tej prawdy to pierwszy krok do mądrości. Theodore Isaac Rubin
Dobro to tylko to, co szlachetne, zło to tylko to, co haniebne.
Dla człowieka nie tylko świat otaczający jest zagadką; jest on nią sam dla siebie. I z obu tajemnic bardziej dręczącą wydaje się ta druga. Antoni Kępiński (1918-1972)
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