Light to the Hills: A Novel (47)

Months slid by, months Amanda knew Frank wasn’t pulling shifts at the mine, months she grew rounder and clumsier, months Frank was gone more and more, even at night, leaving her lonely and sleepless as she barred the door to the unsavory elements of the town. She’d sit in the rocker, rubbing her belly and sipping raspberry-leaf tea to make her womb strong. Often, Amanda had jolted awake from gunshots and cursing out in the road, someone insulted or cheated or looked at wrong. It didn’t matter that she wore a band on her finger or that she was swelled up like a ripe melon. Lonely men followed her with desperate eyes as she waddled to and from the store or visited with an occasional neighbor. It wasn’t long before she and Frank had their first real squabble.

“Nice you could cross the doorstep, finally,” Amanda had said by way of greeting Frank midmorning. He’d stumbled into the cabin, smelling like woodsmoke and yeast, his beard a scruffy tangle.

“What’s that s’posed to mean?”

“I never know when to expect you anymore, Frank. Didn’t sleep a wink all night because of those no-counts fighting and yelling, and you laying out all night, no telling where.”

“I been working, it so happens,” he groused. “To feed all the mouths ’round here.”

Mad as she’d been, Amanda’s eyes had welled. “Sorry to be such a burden.” She held up her left hand and wiggled her fingers. “You seemed to want to take that on, so you said.”

Frank had waved a dismissive hand. “I don’t know what you’re so tore up about. I’m here, ain’t I? And I’m providing.” He fished in the pocket of his overalls and tossed a rolled-up wad of bills on the table. “That right there’ll go a lot further’n mine scrip. Might even get us to California.” He’d grinned and sidled up to her, more than he’d done in a month of Sundays. Amanda had pushed him off.

“If you were ever serious about California, we coulda left months ago, before I got big.”

Frank dropped his arms by his sides. “Why you want to be like that?” he’d asked. “You’re bowed up all the time and prickly as a porcupine.”

“Why can’t you tell Gripp you’re through? It’s no good here, Frank. I’m by myself most all the time. I can handle a gun—it’s not that—but this baby’s gonna change things. Don’t you want better? For him?”

“Shoot, I want better for me, puddin’. Maybe if they was just handing out money easy as pie, but you wait around for that, and there’s a big fat zero at the end of that line.”

Two nights after they’d argued, the Kentucky wind grew tired of blowing the dust around, kicked its feet up, and settled on the town so still and hot even the jays quit scrapping with each other and sat on rooftops with their beaks open, panting like dogs. Amanda had propped the windows open and sat inside with a cup of water in her lap, dribbling trails of it down the neck of her dress and on the inside of her arms to try to keep cool. Her back had been aching something fierce all day, and all she wanted was blessed rest for a few minutes, maybe prop her feet up so that the swelling that had started up in her ankles would go down.

She’d unfastened the top buttons on her dress and flapped the thin material to stir a bit of air. Earlier, she’d carried buckets of water down the short rows of their kitchen garden, tending the parched tomatoes and beans before they withered altogether. No wonder her back hurt. She rose to start supper, a slab of ham and red-eye gravy with some sliced tomatoes, puny ones from the shrunken vines. No telling if Frank would even be there for it. Amanda wiped her sweating brow with the hem of her dress, not caring that her bare belly poked out, exposed.

A noise at the door made her turn her head, and she dropped her hem. A miracle: Frank was in time for supper for once. But it hadn’t been Frank at all. Despite the heat, a cold finger of ice trailed down Amanda’s spine and settled in the pit of her stomach.

“You’re finer’n a frog hair split four ways,” Gripp said. He leaned against the doorframe like he’d been there awhile. “Even big as you are.” Gripp’s mud-coated boots left a mess on the floor as he carefully shut the door and covered the distance between them.

“Frank oughta be here anytime,” Amanda said, her voice bright as a knife. “I’ve about got supper ready.” Her eyes darted to the bed in the corner and the box beneath it where her pistol lay.

Gripp leveled her with his stare. “You and me both know Frank ain’t anywhere near here.” He was close enough now that Amanda could smell the whiskey and the foul odor of fresh chicken shit. She swallowed hard. “All those times you two lovebirds picnicked in the woods, you never once thought to invite your good friend?” Gripp placed a meaty hand over his heart. “That was downright hurtful. After all I done for you.”

“All you done?” Amanda couldn’t keep the sneer from her voice.

Gripp swept an arm around the shanty. “Who you think’s behind your cozy setup? Who got Frank a job? Who’s the manager of this operation?” He gave a mock bow.

“You’re jiggered.”

“I believe you’re right.” Gripp pulled a metal flask from his left pocket and shook it. “A sample of Kentucky’s finest.” He’d barked a laugh as he pointed at her. “Or maybe that’s what we should call you. You were something else, rolling around in the leaves with Frank.” He whistled a long slow note and shut his eyes to savor the memory.