Carla Kelly by Borrowed Light

wave of embarrassment crash against her. Julia Darling, even if you wouldn't keep a goat here, this is Mr. Otto's home, and you have frightened him away from it! she scolded herself.
    When she took a moment to think through her emotions, she had to admit only a fool would suppose that single men would keep an orderly kitchen. There are four or five busy men on this place, she thought as she looked around, and no woman to insist on cleanliness.
    She looked around the room, taking in the dust-covered icebox and the range. The range. Her eyes widened. “It can't be,” she said, scarcely breathing. “Not here. I'm dreaming.”
    Julia got to her feet, moving slowly as though she did not wish to startle the object of her sudden interest. Was I so agitated when I came in here that I overlooked this? she asked herself in amazement. Keeping her dress tight around her, she squatted decorously in front of the massive cookstove. The afternoon light was going quickly, but she ran her finger over the raised letters on the oven door.
    “The Queen Atlantic,” she whispered reverently. She stood up, admiring the beautiful lines of the range and thinking of the visit that the plain cooking class had made to the Portland Stove Showroom on Union Street. Miss Farmer had extolled the Queen's virtues right down to the keep-ash pit. “This is the last word in kitchen ranges,” Miss Farmer had pronounced. “I doubt we shall ever see a finer one.”
    The gloss was long since gone from the Queen's surface. One claw foot curled under itself like a deformity with a block of wood to level the range. Julia tried to lift one of the stove lids, but it was anchored shut by a rim of grease, which had solidified and turned to concrete. She peeked in the water reservoir, but there was only a handful of bones. She shuddered and dropped the lid.
    The warming oven contained the mummified remains of what might have been a loaf of bread. Someone had stuck a jar of grape jelly next to it. Greasy streaks formed a deckle around the splashboard and matched the solid fat covering the range. She wondered if someone had just cooked on the stove top, without benefit of pans.
    Julia walked to the side of the range. Leaning over, she tapped on the stovepipe, listening for the echo found on a healthy specimen. “Your Majesty, that stuffy sound tells me you have far exceeded the Wyoming state creosote limit,” she announced, on sure footing now. “One good blaze in the firebox, and you would burn down this wonderful house. Oh, I am tempted.”
    Could it be that this range has never been cleaned? she asked herself. She pried the knife from the jelly jar, ran the blade around a stove lid until she could lift it, and peered inside. “My stars!” she exclaimed, staring at ashes that were level with the stove hole. She replaced the stove lid slowly, careful not to stir up ashes.
    She peeked in the oven instead and coughed. No one has ever cleaned this range, she thought. She backed away from the range as the enormity of the work before her became amply clear.
    It was a daunting thought, and one best not contemplated for too long on an empty stomach, she decided. She turned around, wishing the problem away. She opened the door next to the stove, into a small room that must be hers. She saw a bed frame with a fairly new mattress, a limp curtain on a string pulled back to reveal a row of clothes pegs next to a bureau with a drawer missing, and a washstand. “Home, sweet home,” she murmured and shut the door. “I don't know how I shall bear to part with all this in a year and return to Salt Lake.”
    She opened the other door off the kitchen, which turned out to be the pantry. Julia sucked in her breath at the sound of scurrying feet and closed it quickly, but not before seeing kegs and barrels and smelling the pungent aroma of dried fish and mouse nests.
    She opened the outside door and took a deep breath. There was no one in sight; the men must be hiding. No matter. The