“These are nice,” he said, surprised to see something so neat and clean in the midst of all the junk.
“Thank you. I thought you might appreciate them. Most of them can be used for carpet and canvas as well. The curved ones are more for upholstery.”
He nodded. “And you sew sacks?”
“In the wheat harvest. It’s just for a short while each year, but it gives me something for myself.”
“I see. That’s coming up before long, isn’t it?”
“Yes, it is. So I get out my needles and twine, and I take a few turns for practice. I’ve got different stitches I can make, but I start with the easiest one.”
She took out a four-inch straight needle, handed the case back to Fielding, pulled and cut a length of heavy cotton twine from a spindle on her left, and threaded the needle, leaving about six inches of loose twine coming out one side of the needle eye. Next she adjusted the sack of rags, twisted an ear on the right corner of the open end, wound three loops around the base, and pulled it tight with a half hitch. Then, after pulling another six inches of twine through the eye on the loose end, she held the seams with her left hand as she looped her stitches across the top of the sack. In less than a minute she had reached the other end, where she twisted the left ear and tied it off.
“That’s pretty good,” said Fielding. “It looks as if you could do one per minute.”
“If they came that fast. I understand they do, with some of these steam threshers. They can keep two sack-sewers busy at once.”
“There’s not enough grain around here for someone to go to all the trouble of bringing in a steam engine, is there? That’s what they tell me.”
“Not yet,” she said. “And I’m not in a hurry for it.” Then, as if she caught herself, she added, “Not that I mind the work. I just wouldn’t want to live for it.” She motioned with her arm at the backyard. “It’s like all of this. I can put up with it, but I don’t want to live in the midst of it for the rest of my life.”
Fielding took heart. “It’s not in your blood, then. All this stuff.”
“Not like Papa’s. He can live in a run-down place cluttered with scraps, and it doesn’t bother him. I can’t say it bothers me greatly, not now, but I can’t see it as the rest of my life, not any more than working for day wages on a threshing crew or in a factory. Don’t you think?”
“Well, sure. It’s how you yourself see it.”
She seemed to be in thought as she stood up, took the sack by the two ears, and set it inside the lean-to. As she sat down she smiled at him and said, “And how about you? I would imagine you’re satisfied with what you do because you chose it.” She held out her hand for the case, and as he gave it to her, his fingers touched hers.
“Yes,” he said. “I’d say I like my work well enough.” He did not feel as if he had to be on his guard with what he said, so he went on. “I’ve never had much of anything, so I’m not disappointed with what I’ve got. I’ve never had a place of my own, and I think I’d like to do that. Have a place where the rest of the world leaves you alone when you want.”
“That’s a good way to put it.” She turned her dark eyes on him and added, “Oh, I hope you don’t think I’m ungrateful for what I’ve got. After all, Papa does have a place of his own, and I’ve never wanted for anything. I work because I want to.”
“I understand that.”
“And there’s nothing wrong with that kind of work. That’s where we started, wasn’t it? I said I just didn’t want to live for the sake of working on a threshing crew.”
“I don’t blame you. Some of those machines make a lot of racket, especially the steam engines.”
“Well, there’s the racket, and then the drudgery.” She paused. “And the people you work with.”
“I’ve met some of them,” said Fielding. “Here and there. Packed supplies for a couple of ’em a while back. And this fellow Mullins and his kid, Grant, they worked roundup with us.”
“Oh, he’s all right,” said Isabel. “There are others, though. You don’t know Ray Foote, do you?”
Fielding shook his head. “Don’t believe I’ve heard the name till now. Did you say Foot?”
“Foot with an e,” she said. Then, with an impatient huff, she went on. “He’s the one thing I dread most about this work coming up. He’s a sack jig.”
“What’s that?”
“Oh, that’s the person who jigs or shakes the sack so it has a uniform weight—hundred and thirty-eight to hundred and forty pounds. He jigs it and passes it to me to sew. I can’t stand the way he looms over me, always making eyes at me, showing off how strong he is, hefting the full sacks. But he’s got the mind of a slug. And when he counts the sacks, if he has four rows of five each, he counts them one by one.”
Fielding smiled. He didn’t mind that kind of competition. “I guess that’s the way work is,” he said. “You can’t always pick who you work with. But if it’s only for a while—”
“Yes, but he’s taken to Papa, making friends with him. Buys him a drink in town, gives him a bottle to take home. I think he might be at Bill’s this evening. He got himself invited, and Bill said he could come down with Mr. Mullins.”
“Oh, well,” said Fielding with a playful smile, “as long as he doesn’t keep you tied up all evenin’, showin’ you the muscle in his arm.”
“Pooh,” she said. “If you don’t mind, you can keep me away from him. And don’t leave before he does.”
Fielding laughed. “I think I can do that much.”
“I’m glad you’re going to be there.”
“I wouldn’t miss it.”
Her dark eyes met his again. “I hope you don’t think I was saying anything unkind about Papa.”
“Oh, no. Like I said, I understand. And if some of this isn’t in your blood—” He was about to say, “So much the better,” but he left the sentence unfinished.
“He always says I take after Mama. You never met her, but she was a lovely lady.”
“Oh, then I agree with your father.”
A blush came to Isabel’s tan complexion. “Well, I take after her in other ways. She liked music, painting. She was adventurous, coming up here with Papa. She wanted to see new places. He was young then, too, of course.”
“Did they homestead this place?”
“No. Papa bought it from someone else who started here. Papa worked in a creamery in Cheyenne, and he met the man that way. He and Mama sold everything they had—except me—and came here. It wasn’t good for Mama, though.” She stopped, then forced a smile. “Let’s not be sad. We were talking about the party tonight. You like music, don’t you?”
“Oh, sure.”
“Maybe there’ll be music there. Sometimes Mr. Lodge plays a song or two.”
“Really? I didn’t know he did.”
“Otherwise, it might be rather dull. Just Papa, Bill Selby, Mr. Mullins, Ray Foote—”
“And myself, of course, not to mention you. I think the kid who works for me will come along as well.”
“Oh, yes. You had better be there. If I get trapped into a long conversation with Ray Foote, I’ll have you to blame.”
“Fear not,” he said. “I’ll be there, if only for that reason.”
Fielding and Bracken rode to Selby’s together as the sun was slipping behind the hills to the west. The kid had bought a used Colt .45 with holster and gun belt, and he was fiddling with the outfit to see how it rode best when he was in the saddle. Fielding, who had thought the kid was going to buy a jacket for the trip into the mountains, found himself getting impatient with the fuss.