The Listening Sky Read online

  “Then why did you ask me?” Jane mouthed at his back.

  Her eyes swept the group and caught the look on the face of one of the women who had held herself apart from the others since she had joined them at the stage station. She had arrived with a Mexican man, who had left immediately. Because the two had conversed in Spanish, Jane presumed her to be Mexican even though she seemed tall for a Mexican woman. She was large-boned and stood ramrod straight. Black straight hair hung down her back to her waist. The woman’s gaze lingered on Jane’s face for several seconds before she turned and watched Kilkenny as he made his way to the front of the crowd.

  “Ladies, this way.”

  Twelve women followed T.C. Kilkenny. A tall, red-haired woman with green eyes hurried to walk beside him. Then a quiet, dark-haired woman picked up her valise and trailed along, as did another gripping the hand of a small boy. A slender, obviously pregnant mother holding the hand of a girl hardly out of diapers and a woman with a shy young daughter were joined by several young, strong women in their teens. Jane and Polly brought up the rear.

  Jane insisted on carrying Polly’s carpetbag as well as her own heavy valise. After going a short distance, she stopped to shift the heavy load to her other hand. Kilkenny was beside her as she straightened, and he took the valise from her hand, leaving the lighter bag for her to carry. He walked away without a word, causing Jane to wonder if the man had eyes in the back of his head.

  His action was noted by the Mexican woman and the one with dyed-red hair.

  Kilkenny led them to a low log building. The moment Jane entered the newly built building she knew that it was not meant to be permanent quarters. So many women could not live in harmony for long in such close proximity.

  Along the windowless wall was a field bed. It extended the length of the building. Narrow grass-filled mattresses lay along the wooden slab. Neatly folded blankets had been placed along the foot of the communal bed. On the wall at the far end of the room was a shelf with several basins and pitchers. A square glass mirror hung above them. Sitting in the middle of the room was a large Acme heater with a shiny tin chimney going up through the roof. The heat radiating from it was a welcome antidote to the chill of the late afternoon breeze that came down from the mountains.

  A bench stretched along the foot of the long bed. Upon this Kilkenny placed Jane’s valise. Then he went to the far corner of the room to pull back a curtain and reveal a tin bathtub and two large tin water buckets.

  “We have no shortage of water. It comes from a spring and is piped to a reservoir behind the cookhouse. The cook will bring you the first bucket of hot water, and later you can heat your own on the laundry stove.” He gestured to ward a small two-burner stove with another shiny tin chimney going out the side of the building.

  “How nice,” Jane said, again under her breath.

  “The privy out back is strictly for ladies only.”

  “Where do we eat?” The question came from a girl with a mass of unruly blond hair, a slender wiry build and a constant smile. She was young and healthy and seemed to take everything in stride. She had said to Jane, “Call me Sunday. My mama had a young’un for every day in the week. I’m glad I wasn’t born on Saturday.”

  “You’ll eat in the cookhouse. The men will eat first, then cook will send his helper for you. Tomorrow I’ll interview each of you. There is plenty of work to keep you busy while you’re waiting for the job you were hired to do.”

  “Like what?” Jane asked.

  Kilkenny’s eyes honed in on Jane’s face and stayed there for a few seconds before he answered. Her heart pounded, but her expression did not change. A facade of haughty dignity was far more effective, she had learned, than cringing uncertainty.

  “Washing, cooking, sewing—”

  “—How long do we stay… here?” Jane interrupted. Then before he answered, “Do you not have a rooming house or a hotel?”

  “The hotel and rooming house are being repaired. Have you run a hotel?”

  “No. But—”

  “—But?”

  “But it wouldn’t be too difficult.”

  “I can’t very well put you up in a hotel or rooming house with a hole in the roof, can I?” He raised dark brows and his eyes raked over her coolly. Someone tittered. “Any more questions?”

  “Not tonight.” Her tone was frosty.

  “Very well. I’ll leave you to get settled in.”

  He walked the length of the building with quick, purposeful steps. He paused in front of the Mexican woman and tipped his hat.

  “Señora Cabeza.”

  “Hola, T.C.”

  He continued toward the door. The flame-haired, green-eyed woman stepped out in front of him.

  “Mr. Kilkenny…” The name rolled off her tongue like a caress. “I don’t wish to stay here. I’ll buy one of the completed cabins.”

  His stare would have intimidated most women. This one appeared to enjoy it. She tilted her head and flung a mass of loose red hair over her shoulder. She was not a young innocent and did not pretend to be.

  “We’ll discuss it tomorrow when you have your interview.”

  He stepped around her and continued on, but as his eyes met Jane’s his steps slowed. Jane’s eyes looked into his, straight and clean, not boldly, but with assurance and a little amusement. He regarded her with an icy stare, but his expression in no way detracted from the splendor of his face. He was as handsome a man as Jane had ever seen. No wonder the red-haired woman was panting after him.

  T.C. walked past Jane, taking with him a flashing memory of rich, dark reddish-brown hair framing a fine-boned face, stormy smoke-blue eyes shot with silver, and a tilted pointed chin.

  She was… proud as a peacock. And a lady to boot. Why in hell would such a woman come here? He had not had the time to study the applications sent by his solicitor, but you could bet your boots he would as soon as he got back to his house.

  And… what the hell was Patrice Guzman Cabeza doing here? Was his solicitor out of his mind? Patrice’s husband must still be alive. No word to the contrary had reached the town. If she figured to be coddled and waited on here, she was in for a surprise. Everyone carried his own weight in this town. It would be a sight to see Senor Ramon Cabeza’s wife bent over a washtub. And the redhead—if she had money to buy her own house, why was she here? Hell, at times T.C. wondered at the craziness of sending for the women.

  With a few exceptions Kilkenny was pleased with the newcomers. He had hoped for more big, strong ranch or farm women. He calculated that even after the arrivals tomorrow, there would still be two single men to every single woman in town. And when the men came in from the cutting camps, the ratio would be more like four to one. He had hoped to reduce the number of single men; he didn’t want to resort to bringing in “ladies of the night.”

  Men without women for long stretches of time, especially during the winter months, became quarrelsome. Unhappy, restless men were unproductive workers. Families built towns, families with children, churches, schools and law and order.

  Kilkenny had deliberately furnished the women’s barracks with only the bare necessities. He was counting on their nesting instincts to take over. After a week crowded in with other women, a place of one’s own and a man to do for would become very appealing.

  He had caught disappointment in the faces of some. The town did look like a flash-mining town, which it had been ten years earlier. Tents and make-do shelters stood along the street among the weatherbeaten empty buildings. But in a month or two all of that would be changed.

  Kilkenny had no scruples about his matchmaking. After all, God took a rib from Adam and made Eve. Women were created to mate with men to ensure the continuance of the human race. As the weaker of the sexes, women sought to be provided for and protected. And what better way to accomplish that than as wives and mothers?

  He approached the group of new men waiting to speak to the foreman.

  “Hey, boss man,” one called. “That’s a fine-lo
okin’ herd a mares ya brought in.”

  “And I’m a rarin’ to mount me one,” said another.

  T.C. tamped down the anger that boiled up in him. He looked at the face of each man before he spoke. It had long been a habit of his to look a man in the eyes and study him. He knew immediately that what he had here were two men showing off for a dozen others.

  He folded his arms across his chest, spread his booted feet, rocked back on his heels and suppressed the desire to plant his fist in the man’s face. He waited so long to speak that the men grew restless.

  “You’re going to get away with those remarks this time because there may be something wrong with your hearing and you didn’t hear me the first time around. So I’m telling you again that if I hear of any of you referring to a woman in this town as a mare and being anxious to mount her, that man will spend the rest of his life eating without teeth, and he will ride out of here with his ass kicked up between his shoulders. Do I make myself clear?”

  The last man to speak hung his head. “Ah… Milo said they was here for… that.”

  The man called Milo Callahan grinned inanely, showing a wide space between his two front teeth, one of which had been broken in half. He had a broad face and a cockiness that immediately rubbed Kilkenny the wrong way. He appeared to Kilkenny to be a braggart and a bully, tough in body and weak in mind. T.C. wondered vaguely if he were related to the Callahan who had a lumber business over in the Bitterroot Range.

  “The ladies answered the advertisement the same as you did. I will provide jobs for them if they do not choose to marry. They are not whores.”

  “If’n they ain’t, why’d they come?” Milo asked. “Ain’t no decent woman comin’ way out here thinkin’ to find work ‘cepts on her back.”

  “Their reasons are no business of yours. Three of them are widow ladies. One has a babe on the way. They will be treated with respect or you’ll answer to me.”

  “I knowed right off what ya meant when I saw the bill nailed to the wall. What was we to think? Single women for cookin’, washin’. Hell, men cook and wash. Single women mean jist one thin’ to single men.”

  “Who gets first chance to court ‘em?” The question came from a heavy-shouldered lumberjack with a scarred face. “It ain’t fair fer the fellers already here to get first go at ‘em.”

  Kilkenny’s eyes honed in on the man with no betrayal of the disgust swirling through him. But there was a stillness about him that suggested a cougar poised to leap on prey.

  “The ladies will do the choosing. If your attention is unwelcome, that’s all there is to it. If you act in any way disrespectful toward any of them, you’ll answer to me. Understand?” He looked at each of the men, then added, “You’ve been warned. After we get these buildings ready for winter we’ll have some kind of shindig. There’ll be games and a dance. You can pay your respects to the women then; but, like I said, if your attention is not wanted, back off.”

  In the answering stillness Kilkenny heard his name called. He looked toward his own house; the two-storied structure was the last building on the street and sat across from the cookhouse and the new building put up for the women. A man stood on the porch beckoning.

  Kilkenny turned back to the group of new men. “Have. you talked to the foreman?”

  “We’re waitin’ fer him.”

  “Go on over to the cookhouse and eat. You can talk to him after supper.”

  He could feel the eyes of the men on his back as he crossed the street and went up the steps to his porch. Of the dozen new men, the two he’d needed to warn could very well be troublemakers. Another, the one with the felt hat and leather vest, had watched the exchange with a smirk on his face. Kilkenny mentally went over the list of the men and came up with the name Bob Fresno. He was smarter than the others. He had let Milo do the talking for him. Kilkenny could read a man just as he could read a good stand of timber. This one and Milo were the ones to watch.

  The young man who met him on the porch and followed him into the house was as tall as Kilkenny but heavier. His hair was light, baby-fine, and hung over his ears. He had a thin sprinkling of light fuzz on his face. He wore a belt and a gun that lay snugly against his thigh.

  “It’s Doc again.”

  “Drunk?”

  “As a skunk.”

  “Where did he get the whiskey?”

  “Stole it from the saloon while Parker was in the back room, I reckon. He knows better than to give him any.”

  “Is he out cold?”

  “As cold as a well-digger’s ass.”

  “Let him sleep it off.”

  “Yeah? Well, a peeler from the north camp came in with a carbuncle boil under his arm.”

  “Bad one?”

  “Big as a teacup.”

  “Can you lance it?”

  “Hellfire, T.C., ya know I ain’t got no stomach for doctorin’.”

  Kilkenny shook his head. “Guess I’ll have to do it. Where’s the man?”

  “Sittin’ back there, holdin’ his arm over his head and cussin’ Doc.”

  “Doc still spitting up blood?”

  “Saw a spattering in the spittoon.”

  “Damn fool is killing himself. Let’s take care of the peeler, Herb. Hell of a job to do before supper.”

  Herb made a gagging sound. “Why’d ya have to go and say that for?”

  Kilkenny hung his hat on a peg and went down the center hallway to the room that served as the surgery.

  Chapter 2

  “PUT out the lamp and go to bed!”

  Raw irritation edged the voice that came from the far end of the communal bed. Jane continued washing her arms and shoulders. The bathtub had been in constant use. Some of the women had taken as long as half an hour to bathe, then had left the water to be emptied by the next person who wished to use clean water. Knowing it would be midnight before they could use the tub, Jane had built a fire in the laundry stove and had heated a bucket of water for herself and Polly. They had washed in one of the large tin washbasins. The young girl now lay at the end of the bed, her face to the wall.

  Jane set the basin on the floor and slipped her tired, aching feet into the warm water. It felt so good. She vowed to take a full bath and wash her hair at the first opportunity.

  “Go to bed!”

  “Hush yore mouth. Ya make more noise than she does.” Jane recognized the cheerful voice of Sunday.

  “She can pretty herself up in the mornin’.”

  “She’d not have to wash this late if you’d not hogged the tub,” Sunday replied.

  “Hogged the tub? Who the hell is talkin’?”

  “If she’s got her eye on the boss man, it’ll do her no good.” This voice had the slurry accent of the South.

  “Who ain’t got a eye on him? Lordy mercy. He’s the best-lookin’ thin’ I’ve seen in all my born days. And the cook says he ain’t got no wife.”

  “Bet he’s wild as a turpentined cat in bed.”

  This brought a gaggle of giggles.

  “He’s gonna interview us tomorrow. What’s that mean? Whatever it is, I’m glad I brought my rose toilet water.”

  “Did ya bring pads for yore bosom?”

  “I ain’t needin’ ‘em. I’d put my tits up against yores any-day.”

  “Not against mine, you won’t!”

  This brought a gale of laughter.

  Jane opened the back door and threw out her wash water. After blowing out the lamp she undressed in the dark, slipped her nightdress over her head and lay down beside Polly.

  Something wasn’t right here. She had known it the minute the wagon arrived in Timbertown. This wasn’t even a town… yet. No more than ten buildings lined the main street.

  Jane was puzzled as to where the women were going to live and work. The hotel and what could be the rooming house were badly in need of repair. She had seen nothing that could be called a bake shop, laundry or eating place. Kilkenny had built a saloon, but not a church or school, even though she had seen a g
oodly number of children.

  The solicitor had mentioned a need for women to make shirts and other clothing. Was the great Mr. Kilkenny going to put all of them to work sewing? Or was he of a mind to use them as saloon girls?

  Anger quickened her heartbeat.

  The building where they had eaten their supper was a new one. Bill Wassall, the cook, a man of about sixty years with a limp and a crooked arm, had told her the building would be a restaurant when the hotel was opened.

  Jane and Polly, the last to go for supper, had lingered after the others had gone back to the barracks. Jane offered to help with the cleanup. Bill had declined the offer, saying he had a “bull cook” who would clean during the night and have a fire ready for the breakfast mess. He was fond of talking and was delighted to have found an interested listener. He explained that in a lumber camp the cook was “king bee” and his helper was “bull cook” or “cookie.”

  The cutting camps, several miles from town, would soon be going full blast. Most of the men in the camps worked by the season. Work would slack off at the mill when the river froze. Some of the men would spend the winter here in town repairing stores and other business places along Main Street. Sites for a tonsorial parlor, a laundry, a jail, a school and a church had been picked out. Another saloon would go up if someone came to run it.

  Bill Wassall was enthusiastic about the town, and evidently considered T.C. Kilkenny a gift from heaven. He included the man’s name in almost every sentence he uttered.

  According to Bill, T.C. Kilkenny was a smart, fair-minded man. She learned that he was a cattleman, but that he was also the best all-around lumberjack in the territory. He was the top high-climber, river pig, peeler, topper, trimmer and all-around “bull of the woods.” Bill explained that was another term for camp foreman. According to the cook, Kilkenny was also an outstanding bare-knuckle fighter and would take on all challengers once the work slackened.

  By the time Bill finished singing Kilkenny’s praises, Jane wanted to gag. She wondered why God had allowed such a perfect man to descend to earth.

  “Known T.C. since he was a pup. Knowed Colin too. Colin’ll be in in a day or two.”