Wanderlust Creek and Other Stories by Elisabeth Grace Foley Page A

tar-paper shanty
with—”
    “Bob’s not going to get a job here. He’s
going back mustanging in the mountains again, and I’m going to go
with him.”
    This time even Gerald’s outrage failed him.
“What!”
    Lainey explained animatedly, still not fully
appreciating the gathering storm. “I told you, Bob wants to raise
horses, and he’s got some mares, but he’s got to sell a couple more
strings of broncs to get enough money for grazing land. He was
going to go back himself and then we’d get married when he came
back, but I said I could go along with him. I want to.”
    Gerald found his voice again. “No! You ain’t
going. You don’t know your own minds, neither of you. He can just
go on by himself, and you can—”
    “Can stay here and have the cream of Alton
County slung in my face every day till he gets back? Not by a
Mississippi mile!”
    Gerald pawed the air again. “You—you git on
out and git back to what you were doin’! I said what I said and I
ain’t going back on it.”
    Lainey folded her mouth up tight, and then
she plunged through the door to the kitchen, her flying skirts
slapping the doorframe. There she proceeded to heat more water for
the wash with a loud clanging of kettles and stove lids, and gave a
fine study in irony by singing “If ever I marry in all of my life,
a railroader’s bride I’ll be” in a clear carrying voice. Gerald
might not have been able to define irony, but he could feel it—he
gave a few more puffs and snorts and then banged out of the front
door of the shack.
    For two days Gerald glowered, Lainey was
more lively and bright-eyed than ever, and Bob Russell minded his
own business studiously. It had all the hallmarks of a stalemate.
But on the third day Gerald looked a little smug, for he had heard
through the grapevine that Bob Russell was having his pack-horses
reshod and laying in supplies for a several months’ trip. They’d
get over it after not seeing each other for a few months, he
thought comfortably. He didn’t deceive himself into hoping that
they had quarreled; they were both too practical for that.
    On a windy evening shortly following, Lainey
sneaked out of the shack to meet Bob down by the cattle chute
again. He had his camp outfit lashed to his pack-horses and his
overcoat on, and they kissed goodbye for quite some time, as if to
make up for the long separation ahead of them. Next morning Bob was
gone, and Gerald allowed some more of his good-humor to come back.
One point gained, anyway.
    For a few days everything was back to
normal. Lainey behaved marvelously, so much so that Gerald observed
to himself that she must be growing up some. Depending on the point
of view, this observation was either remarkably accurate or another
good example of irony. The next morning Lainey McCarthy and all her
worldly goods were absent from the shack and from the stockyards
and wagon yard entire, with no trace left behind.
    Gerald roared, considerably. Nobody knew
where she was, but he was sure they were all in a giant conspiracy
against him. Everybody he questioned was only too thankful to have
a clear conscience.
    That was a very bad day at the Alton
stockyards. Breakfast burned, dinner didn’t happen, and supper was
best not mentioned. Most of the men who were there went uptown and
got another one afterwards. The truth of Lainey’s whereabouts did
not transpire till the next afternoon, when Old Digger turned up.
He’d talked to somebody who’d heard it from somebody else. He’d
figured Lainey must have left a letter or something (he said), or
else he’d have been by sooner. Anyway, Lainey had gotten a ride
from an unsuspecting teamster who was leaving the wagon yard at
midnight, who took her as far as the nearest stage stop; and then
had taken the stage to Bright Hollow, two stops further on the
route. Bob Russell met her there and they went out to the Baptist
minister’s claim shanty a mile outside town and got married. They’d
been a little more