rinsing it, putting in ice cubes, taking a pitcher of iced water from the refrigerator, slicing a lemon and perching it on the rim of the glass. The house seemed very hot to him.
“There! There’s nothing like cold water, is there? I was a Harshberger from Miami”—she pronounced it “Miama”—“Miami, Texas, of course. Not the Florida place. I married Jase Fronk in 1951 and he died—well, that’s enough of that.”
“Woolybucket is kind of a strange name,” said Bob. “Is it called after somebody?”
“Named after the woolybucket tree. I guess there used a be a lot a them grew here. Birds like a woolybucket. The leaves in the spring, why they are all fuzzy underneath before they roll out—that’s the wooly buckets. And Cowboy Rose is named after a flar. The wine cup. That’s the other name for the cowboy rose. You couldn’t have a town called ‘Wine Cup.’ Not in teetotal Woolybucket County.”
While he drank his water Bob noticed flamboyant knickknackery everywhere. LaVon said the kitchen was French provincial, though to him it seemed Texas provincial, a clean white linoleum floor, a white Formica table with chrome legs and matching chairs, a calendar on the wall next to a portrait of Jesus constructed of macaroni and seeds, and against the walls aged and noisy white appliances. The dishtowels, stamped Bonjour at the bottom, showed the Eiffel Tower. On the counter stood ceramic jars labeled CAFÉ, SUCRE, FARINE . A poster reproduction of Brassaï’s Steps of Montmartre hung over a wine rack, which contained not wine but bottles of whiskey; a good sign, thought Bob Dollar. She showed him dozens of items she had purchased through mail-order catalogs—a leather hot water bottle cover, a Moroccan oil lamp. Over the cat’s basket—she had a heavy paint tomcat with a bad leg, only one ear and half a tail, the victim of an encounter with the lawn mower—a blue enamel sign declared CHAT LUNATIQUE . Chat mort would have been more accurate, for the somnolent beast lay as one dead hour after hour, rousing only when the refrigerator door opened or when the gangly neighbor boy started the lawn mower.
When he finished his water she said, “Well, let’s go have a look at that bunkhouse.”
“This’s it,” she said, driving him through a bumpy pasture, over a sullen creek toward a motte of cottonwood trees. There was a second fence behind the barbwire made up of old tires on end, packed three deep in overlapping rows. Under the cottonwoods stood a small log building with a porch. A rope ran around the circumference of the porch floor and LaVon explained this was to keep snakes out of the cabin. Inside were four empty bunks, on each a thin mattress folded in half, a stack of blankets, four wooden chairs at a square table. There was a tiny stove with a blackened teakettle on it and against the wall a wood box full of kindling and sticks.
“Spartan,” she said. “There’s no electric. Supply your own sheets and towels. You’ll have to haul water. Get it down the house in the kitchen.”
“I’ll take it,” he said without seriously considering a daily drive across a cow pasture, the labor of lugging water, no telephone, for already he was taking pleasure in the subtle beauty of the panhandle, noting the groves and thickets along watercourses, huge coils of grapevine weaving the trees into a coarse fabric. He thought the bold diagonal of caprock rim that divided the high plains from the southern plains, the red canyons of the Palo Duro striking and exotic.
He unloaded his suitcase, his new briefcase (new only to him, for it had come from Uncle Tam’s shop) with its freight of Global Pork Rind flyers and papers, a pair of pinch-toe cowboy boots shining with polish, and the box of fried chicken he had brought from Perryton. It took only a few minutes to unpack. He went outside and walked around the bunkhouse, starting up a plump, chickenlike bird in the tangled vines along the creek. The sound of
“There! There’s nothing like cold water, is there? I was a Harshberger from Miami”—she pronounced it “Miama”—“Miami, Texas, of course. Not the Florida place. I married Jase Fronk in 1951 and he died—well, that’s enough of that.”
“Woolybucket is kind of a strange name,” said Bob. “Is it called after somebody?”
“Named after the woolybucket tree. I guess there used a be a lot a them grew here. Birds like a woolybucket. The leaves in the spring, why they are all fuzzy underneath before they roll out—that’s the wooly buckets. And Cowboy Rose is named after a flar. The wine cup. That’s the other name for the cowboy rose. You couldn’t have a town called ‘Wine Cup.’ Not in teetotal Woolybucket County.”
While he drank his water Bob noticed flamboyant knickknackery everywhere. LaVon said the kitchen was French provincial, though to him it seemed Texas provincial, a clean white linoleum floor, a white Formica table with chrome legs and matching chairs, a calendar on the wall next to a portrait of Jesus constructed of macaroni and seeds, and against the walls aged and noisy white appliances. The dishtowels, stamped Bonjour at the bottom, showed the Eiffel Tower. On the counter stood ceramic jars labeled CAFÉ, SUCRE, FARINE . A poster reproduction of Brassaï’s Steps of Montmartre hung over a wine rack, which contained not wine but bottles of whiskey; a good sign, thought Bob Dollar. She showed him dozens of items she had purchased through mail-order catalogs—a leather hot water bottle cover, a Moroccan oil lamp. Over the cat’s basket—she had a heavy paint tomcat with a bad leg, only one ear and half a tail, the victim of an encounter with the lawn mower—a blue enamel sign declared CHAT LUNATIQUE . Chat mort would have been more accurate, for the somnolent beast lay as one dead hour after hour, rousing only when the refrigerator door opened or when the gangly neighbor boy started the lawn mower.
When he finished his water she said, “Well, let’s go have a look at that bunkhouse.”
“This’s it,” she said, driving him through a bumpy pasture, over a sullen creek toward a motte of cottonwood trees. There was a second fence behind the barbwire made up of old tires on end, packed three deep in overlapping rows. Under the cottonwoods stood a small log building with a porch. A rope ran around the circumference of the porch floor and LaVon explained this was to keep snakes out of the cabin. Inside were four empty bunks, on each a thin mattress folded in half, a stack of blankets, four wooden chairs at a square table. There was a tiny stove with a blackened teakettle on it and against the wall a wood box full of kindling and sticks.
“Spartan,” she said. “There’s no electric. Supply your own sheets and towels. You’ll have to haul water. Get it down the house in the kitchen.”
“I’ll take it,” he said without seriously considering a daily drive across a cow pasture, the labor of lugging water, no telephone, for already he was taking pleasure in the subtle beauty of the panhandle, noting the groves and thickets along watercourses, huge coils of grapevine weaving the trees into a coarse fabric. He thought the bold diagonal of caprock rim that divided the high plains from the southern plains, the red canyons of the Palo Duro striking and exotic.
He unloaded his suitcase, his new briefcase (new only to him, for it had come from Uncle Tam’s shop) with its freight of Global Pork Rind flyers and papers, a pair of pinch-toe cowboy boots shining with polish, and the box of fried chicken he had brought from Perryton. It took only a few minutes to unpack. He went outside and walked around the bunkhouse, starting up a plump, chickenlike bird in the tangled vines along the creek. The sound of
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