The Personal History of Rachel DuPree_ A Novel - Ann Weisgarber [67]
“But I can’t. I can’t make paths to the barn, not when the snow’s up to my waist. I can’t get hay out to the cattle. I can’t chop ice when the stock tanks are froze up. Not with a baby.”
“You’ve got Mary and John.”
“They can’t take your place.”
“They’ll come close.”
“What about your mother? Ask her—she has money. Then you won’t have to work the mine.”
“No.”
“We’ll pay her back.”
“It’s a handout.”
“It’s your mother.”
“I said no.”
I turned my head like I’d been slapped. Far off, coyotes yipped and howled. My skin crawled. Isaac was going to the gold mine. He didn’t care what I thought. His mind was made up. He was going, and he expected me to run the ranch.
The coyotes’ howling sounded like demons, circling, coming closer. I pinched the corners of my eyes to stop the tears.
“Rachel, look.” Isaac was calmer now. I pinched harder at my eyes; I knew what was coming. He was going to talk me into liking the idea. But not this time. This time he was asking too much. I steeled myself.
He said, “Look, I know this comes as a surprise, and I don’t like it either. But it’s a chance; it’s an opportunity to pull us out of this hard time. I have to do it. They—” He stopped himself, and in that moment I believed I heard what he was thinking but couldn’t say. People expect me to give up; they think I’ve bit off more than I can chew. No Negro, not even Isaac DuPree, is smart enough—tough enough—not when times get hard. But I am, and I’m going to show every last one of them.
“Don’t do this thing,” I said. “Please.”
“I have to. There’s no other way around it. I’m not saying it’ll be easy; it won’t be. But you can do this, Rachel, I know you can. You’ve chopped sod, you’ve strung fences, you’ve driven the horses during planting season. Usually you’ve had a baby in your belly or one on your hip. You’ve done without. You lived in that sod dugout over there longer than most would’ve. You’ve built this place, same as me. Twenty-five hundred acres, Rachel. You and me. Nothing’s too big for you.”
I stared at him.
“Not many men can say that about their women. But I can.”
Nothing’s too big for you. Isaac DuPree admired me. It was in his words and in his voice. It bucked me up. In the dark I felt him looking at me. I imagined a shine in his eyes. Heat rose from my chest, ran up my neck, and made my cheeks burn.
It all came down to this: I still wanted to make Isaac glad that he had married me. I wanted to live up to his admiration. I wanted to hear it again in his voice.
He found my hands. “Come on,” he said, “let’s get some sleep.” I let him pull me to my feet. My hands in his, he rubbed his thumbs along my fingers. Maybe I can do it, I told myself. Isaac had a way of making things work out. It might be a mild winter. Fred Schuling could bring supplies. The shame of giving up would be a burden too heavy to carry. Better to try than to quit.
“All right,” I said.
“You’re made of grit,” Isaac said. He put an arm around my shoulders and steered me to the door. The letter in my apron pocket crackled. I put my hand to it.
“Not now,” Isaac said. “It’s late.”
I nodded. Whatever Sue had to say could wait.
12
JOHNNY
Nothing’s too big for you. Those were the words I heard in my mind the next day. I heard them when the rain started back up again, beating the tin roof. I heard them as water ran into the downspouts and gushed into the rain barrels. Rain pinged in the basins that lined the edge of the porch, and the words tapped in my mind. Three days of rain and everything was better. Three days of rain and a fast-moving stream coursed through the wash by the cottonwood.
It was a day for inside work. Isaac and John were in the barn going over equipment, seeing what needed cleaning and oiling and what needed fixing. Me and Mary worked in the kitchen and the little girls played under the table with their rag dolls. Mary stirred the big pot on the cookstove; she was boiling pillowcases. I folded one that she’d finished and cranked it through the wringer. A basin caught the squeezed-out water.