would be like to be the other.”
He took his time answering. “I figure you can say that ’bout any two peoples.
Folks think they understand each other, but they ain’t none of ’em do. Ain’t nobody knows what it be like to be nobody else.” He got to his feet while he was
talking. That seemed to be all the conversation he could tolerate.
“Do you think a man and a woman ever understand each other?” She looked
up at him.
“They don’t gotta understand each other. They gotta need each other.”
“What’s a man need a woman for, if not understanding? Companionship?”
“Man need a woman plenty and I don’t mean just for … you know. Not ever
body be like your daddy, can bring anything he want home from his store, pay
that Mrs. Hardaway to keep his house. Look at the way things use to be, ’fore they had ever thing in stores. Man could grow all the wheat in the world, but if
his wife ain’t been grindin’ the flour and bakin’ the bread, he warn’t eatin’. That
the way things still be for folks what ain’t got no money.”
Olivia smiled. “That isn’t what Lady Grody says. She says a woman’s job is
to create a retreat of peace and quiet for her husband.”
“Ain’t so quiet if his stomach be howlin’. She best be makin’ a racket in the
kitchen.”
“When I was a little girl I used to daydream about how I would keep house
for my husband. Keep his shoes shined and his collars pressed. I even imagined
the wood box next to the stove, the way I’d have all the sticks of wood in neat
rows, all the same length.”
“That be crazy women stuff you gonna do for you, not him. He know a short
crooked stick burn as hot as a long straight one.” Mourning turned to retreat to
the barn, muttering about something he had forgotten to do.
Left alone with her thoughts, Olivia’s mind kept running in circles around
Jeremy Kincaid. Maybe she should take him a loaf of bread. He’d brought them
that tin of coffee, hadn’t he? What was wrong with a neighborly gift? But how
would she find her way to his cabin, knowing only the general direction? She rose and began throwing dirt on the fire. He knows exactly where to find me, she thought, and hasn’t come within a hundred paces. He isn’t sitting around hoping
to see me coming up the trail. He plain doesn’t care one whit about seeing me.
But what if something’s happened to him? What if he stepped in a gopher hole
and broke his ankle? Or was on his way to pay me a call when Ernest gotspooked and threw him? He could be lying somewhere in the woods right now.
Shouldn’t good neighbors check in on one another from time to time, make sure
everything is all right?
She scolded herself again. Put out the fire, get ready for bed, and think about
something else. Tomorrow is going to be a long day. The Stubblefields are
coming to take the oxen and I guess I ought to invite them to stay for dinner.
“They should be here soon,” Olivia said the next day when Mourning walked in from the farm to help her carry a tub of wet wash up to the line. “After I hang
these, I’m going to start getting the meal on the table. I’ll bang two pots together
when it’s time to wash your hands.”
“You go ’head and eat. I get something later, after they gone.”
