Outlawed(22)

“But suppose, hypothetically speaking, a person were to suffer from insomnia of a chronic nature. Suppose that this person found it impossible to sleep for months, even years. Suppose it seemed, at times, that this person had never slept.”

I remembered now that I’d woken more than once in the middle of the night to see the Kid’s bunk in the great room empty.

“One man in our town had terrible insomnia,” I said. “Mama made him a tea out of valerian root. She also told him to stop drinking whiskey—it makes you drowsy, but then you wake up in the middle of the night, worse off than you were before.”

“Did it help?” the Kid asked.

“It did,” I said. “But this man—”

I paused. I wasn’t sure how to explain what had troubled Edward Carrier. It was not unlike the sickness Mama had suffered after Bee was born, except that Edward Carrier was not a mother, and instead of lying in his bed all day he paced his house all night, frightening his children.

“This man was sick at heart,” I said finally. “Nothing brought him any joy, not even his baby son. Once he told Mama that the flowers his wife planted smelled ugly to him, that they smelled like vomit.”

A look crossed the Kid’s face. It was fleeting, but I recognized it as fear.

“What happened to this man?” the Kid asked.

“He was sick for months,” I said. Actually Edward had suffered for two years, but I didn’t want to tell the Kid that. “Then he started to get better. By the time I left town he was sleeping well and playing with his children again.”

The Kid nodded and began walking back to the firepit.

“Tell Agnes Rose to get some valerian next time she goes to see the trader,” the Kid said. “And any other herbs you need to treat common ailments. You should have a fully stocked pharmacy at your disposal.”

My last lessons came from Lo. In the storage shed between the bunkhouse and the barn, I stood shirtless in my dungarees as she looped a measuring tape around my chest above, then across my breasts.

“It’s good you’re so flat,” she said. “You won’t need much binding.”

Half of the shed was given over to ammunition and other gun paraphernalia: a case of bullets, another of gunpowder, a third of rods and rags for cleaning. The other half was Lo’s country: a makeshift wardrobe, knocked together out of rough pine boards, held fur-lined parkas, a crinoline, leather chaps, several women’s traveling coats, and countless dresses of muslin, gingham, and lace—tucked between two of them I noticed the Kid’s suit and tails. On pegs were hats of every kind and character: cowboy hats with wide and narrow brims, folded in cattleman’s and cutter styles; several winter hats of beaver fur; and ladies’ hats and fascinators trimmed in ostrich and peacock. Shirts, dungarees, and lacy underthings peeked out of trunks lined up along the walls. Lo rummaged in one of these and extracted a strip of sturdy cotton, six inches wide and several feet long.

“Hold still,” she said.

She wound until the cotton was tight against my skin, then secured it under my arm with safety pins.

“Can you breathe?” she asked.

I nodded.

“Good,” she said, sliding a finger under the cloth to test the snugness. “Too loose and it’ll slide off. Too tight and you’re liable to pass out on us.”

I buttoned my shirt and looked at myself in the mirror hanging on the wardrobe’s door.

“I look like a little girl,” I said.

“That’s because you carry yourself like a little girl,” Lo said. “You have to learn to move like a man.”

I thought of my husband, how when he was nervous, he would scratch one forearm, then the other. How he would wash his face and then run the water backward with his fingers through his hair. I looked at myself in the mirror again. Nothing I remembered seemed like enough to go on.

“First things first,” Lo said. “You have to stand on both feet.”

“I am standing on both feet,” I said.

Lo kicked my left heel. I lost my balance and stumbled forward into the wardrobe, clinging to the coats to keep from falling on my face.

“Sorry, little colt,” said Lo, laughing. “But you see what I mean now. Your weight’s all in your right foot. Men stand with their weight on both feet equally.”

With both feet planted I felt both too heavy and too casual, a big clumsy kid about to barrel down a hill.

“It feels strange,” I said.

“It’s supposed to feel strange,” said Lo, crossing behind me. “Now hook your left thumb in your belt loop.”

I did what I thought I had seen boys and men do, talking to one another at the feed store, loitering against the wall at a dance. Then I felt another kick and stumbled again, this time backward, pinwheeling my arms before regaining my balance.

“You took the weight off your left leg,” Lo said.

“I didn’t.”

“If you hadn’t, little colt, you wouldn’t have fallen over. Now go ahead: do it again.”

This time I was slower and more deliberate.

“Good. Now the right—”

Again I concentrated on holding my body in its odd new shape.

“Very good. Now both thumbs.”

The kick made me jump.

“Ow!” I shouted. “Is this how you taught the others?”