I started to lose consciousness then, for as my eyes took in the sight of these two figures, two young ones setting on the bed, one combing the other one’s hair, and the older one setting in the tub smoking a pipe, her love bags hanging low into the water, my fluids runned clear out of my head and my knees gived way. I slipped to the floor in a dead faint.
I was awakened a minute later by a hand slapping my chest. Miss Abby stood over me.
“You flat as a pancake,” she said dryly. She flipped me over onto my stomach, gripped my arse with a pair of hands that felt like ice tongs. “You small in that department, too,” she grunted, feeling my arse. “You young
I didn’t wait. I leaped to my feet, and in doing so, that pretty white scarf of hers caught my arm and I heard it tear as I took off. I ripped that thing like paper and hit the door running and scampered out. I hit the hallway at full speed and made for the stairs, but two cowboys were coming up, so I busted into the closest door, which happened to be Pie’s room—just in time to see Chase with trousers down and Pie sitting on her bed with her dress pulled down to her waist.
The sight of them two chocolate love knobs standing there like fresh biscuits slowed my step, I reckon, long enough for Miss Abby, who was hot on my tail, to grab at my bonnet and rip it in half just as I dove under Pie’s bed.
“Git out from under there!” she hollered. It was a tight squeeze—the bedsprings was low—but if it was tight for me, it was tighter for Miss Abby, who was too big to lean over all the way and get at me. The smell under that feather bed was pretty seasoned though, downright rank, the smell of a thousand dreams come true, I reckon, being that its purpose was for nature’s deeds, and if I wasn’t worried ’bout getting broke in half, I would’a moved out from under it.
Miss Abby tried pulling the bed from side to side to expose me, but I clung to the springs and moved with the bed as she slung it.
Pie come ’round to the other side of the bed, leaned on all fours and placed her head on the floor. It was a tight fit down there but I could just see her face. “You better come out here,” she said.
“I ain’t.”
I heard the click of a Colt’s hammer snapping back. “I’ll get her out,” Chase said.
Pie stood up and I heard the sound of a slap, then Chase hollered, “Ow!”
“Put that peashooter up before I beat the cow-walkin’ hell outta you,” Pie said.
Miss Abby commenced to razzing Pie something terrible for me ripping her scarf and causing a ruckus in her business. She cussed Pie’s Ma. She cussed her Pa. She cussed all her relations in all directions.
“I’ll fix it,” Pie protested. “I’ll pay for the scarf.”
“You better. Git that girl out, or I’ll have Darg come up here.”
It growed silent. From where I lay, it felt like all the air had left the room. Pie spoke softly—I could hear the terror in her voice—“You don’t have to do that, missus. I’ll fix it. I promise. And I’ll pay for the scarf, missus.”
“Get busy counting your pennies, then.”
Miss Abby’s feet stomped toward the door and left.
Chase was standing there. I could see his bare feet and his boots from where I was. Suddenly Pie’s hand snatched up his boots, and I reckon she handed them to him, for she said, “Git.”
“I’ll straighten it out, Pie.”
“Skinflint! Dumbass. Who told you to bring me that snaggle-mouth headache here? Git out!”
He put on his boots, grumbling and muttering, then left. Pie slammed the door behind him and stood against it, sighing in the silence. I watched her feet. They slowly came toward the bed. She said softly, “It’s all right, honey. I ain’t gonna hurt ya.”
“You sure?” I said.
“Course, baby. You a young thing. You don’t know nuthin’. Sweet thing, ain’t got nobody in the world, coming here. Lord have mercy. It’s a shame, Miss Abby hollering about some silly old scarf. Missouri! Lord, the devil’s busy in this territory! Don’t be scared, sweetie. You gonna suffocate down there. C’mon out, baby.”
The soft tenderness of that woman’s voice moved my heart so much, I slipped out from under there. I come out on the opposite side of the bed, though, just in case she weren’t good for her word, but she was. I could see it in her face when I stood up, watching me from across the bed now, smiling, warm, dewy. She gestured to me with an arm. “C’mon over here, baby. Come ’round the side of the bed.”
I melted right off. I was in love with her right from the first. She was the mother I never knowed, the sister I never had, my first love. Pie was all woman, one hundred percent, first rate, grade A, right-from-the-start woman. I just loved her.
