Once a Father. Kathleen Eagle

raised an instructive finger. “That was another joke.”

      “Of course.” Who would have guessed?

      He moved in close enough to get a peek into the kettle. Audrey stepped to one side, stirring, stirring, stirring. Mary held her ground.

      “You’re not making vanilla, are you?”

      “Strawberry,” Audrey said.

      “Good.” He glanced at Mary as he turned away from the stove. “Why didn’t you bring one of your dogs with you? Show me some of their tricks.”

      “They’re working dogs.”

      “The army doesn’t give them any leave time?” Her father chuckled.

      “She sent us a wonderful training video,” Audrey said as she tested the milk with her finger. “She’s in it, working with the smartest dog I’ve ever seen.” She flipped the burner off, glancing at Mary as she moved the kettle. “I watched it on the computer. He doesn’t like computers.” “They don’t like me.”

      “We should all watch it together,” Audrey suggested. “Mary can tell us more than what they say on the video. I mean, more about what she actually does and how those dogs…” She rummaged in the refrigerator and backed out with eggs and cream. “We could have our ice cream while we watch, and I could pop some—”

      “They’re trying to take over that whole area west of the highway,” Dan said, never one to let a bad joke go to waste. “All that Indian land I’ve been leasing over there.”

      “It’s mostly badlands, isn’t it?” Mary said. Part of her wanted to fall back and ignore his remarks, but the rest of her wanted to take a position and push back.

      “Hell, no. There’s a lot of grass out there, and the Tribe wants to turn it over to those girls and their welfare program for horses.”

      “You hardly use that land. It’s as wild as those horses are.”

      “That’s how much you know about cattle ranching. What’s gonna happen to this place after I’m gone? Between you and your brother….” He drew a deep breath and blew out heated disgust. “You work your whole life to build something solid, and you want to be able to put your name on it and hand it over to heirs who know how to carry on. Born ranchers. Tutan heirs.”

      “Sounds like a group of backup singers,” Mary quipped. “The Tutanaires.”

      “I could sure use some backup for a change. When it comes down to it—and sooner or later it will, between their horses and our cows—we’ll see who’s a Tutan heir. Between you and your brother.”

      “You already said that. How long has it been since you heard from my brother?”

      Silence. Her older brother had left home as soon as he’d finished high school. Mary admired him for putting himself through college and getting involved with the Forest Service in the Pacific Northwest. Sadly, she and Tom had allowed distance and the passage of time to get the better of their relationship.

      “He called me on Mother’s Day,” Audrey said. “He and Adrienne are fine.”

      “Good to know,” Mary said. “If he ever changes his mind about South Dakota, he’s welcome to the place as far as I’m concerned.”

      “He has to change his mind about me first. Owes me—” Dan made a dismissive gesture “—an apology, to start with. After that, he owes me the two thousand dollars I loaned him to get himself a car.”

      “That was for college, Father. The car was—”

      “The car was a piece of crap, but he knew how to keep it running, and he didn’t learn that from any college. Or anything else useful. What’s he doing up there in tree hugger country, for God’s sake? Tell you what, until he meets those two conditions and maybe one or two more, he gets nothing. I’ve written him off.”

      “Mother can always write him back in after you’re gone.” Mary smiled to herself as she watched her mother separate eggs and slide the yokes into a bowl of sugar. “That was another joke.”

      No one was laughing. He’d never be gone. If ever a man was earthbound, it was Dan Tutan. If there was any justice in the world, Mother would outlive him long enough to sell the ranch and blow the proceeds on herself. But Mary had seen enough of the world to know that justice was hard to come by for too many women, and her mother—stirrer of milk, sugar, eggs, anything but controversy—was one of them. She had been living in her husband’s pumpkin shell too long.

      “We’ve got the same kind of humor, Daughter. Nobody else gets it.”

      “Including you and me.” Mary folded her arms and watched him walk away. “I wish I could’ve brought one of the dogs with me,” she told her mother quietly. “I miss having one around.”

      “I wouldn’t mind having a dog here again. Would you pour the milk in while I stir?” Mother sidled along the counter to give Mary access to the kettle of scalded milk. “Make sure it’s cool enough.”

      Mary was no judge of cool. She offered the kettle for her mother’s parchment-skinned finger test.

      Mary nodded, stirred, called for a slow pour and smiled. “Even if you’re not doing all the training yourself, Sally’s contest might keep you here a little longer than you’d planned.”

      “I’m here to see you, Mother. The last thing I want to do is cause stress, so…” So don’t spill the milk, Mary. You might end up crying over it. Her throat stung a little as she swallowed. Damn hormones. She took a deep, cleansing breath and set the kettle aside. Can we talk, Mother? Can we please, just the two of us? “So you’ll tell me if it gets to be too much, won’t you? Because obviously nothing’s…” Changed? Wrong choice. “Nothing’s more important right now than your health. Getting you back to a hundred and ten percent.”

      “Except my hearing.” Audrey’s eyes brightened with a slow smile. “I like to keep that turned down to about fifty. Every other word is plenty.” She nodded toward the refrigerator. “I’ve already mashed up the strawberries. They’re in the—”

      “Blue Tupperware box.” Mary laughed. She was glad Mother’s kitchen hadn’t changed.

      “The salt is on the front porch, and I have ice in the chest freezer.” Audrey folded strawberries into the rich, custardy mixture. “Remember how we used to go out on the porch on summer evenings, and you and the Drexler girls would take turns cranking until you said your arm was going to fall off?” She raised her brow. “You could call them. Tell them we’re making ice cream. I’ll bet they’d come right over.”

      “It’s just us, Mother. I’ll hold the canister, and you pour.”

      The porch glider squeaked, the ice rattled between the walls of the turquoise bucket and the silver canister, and two meadowlarks called to each other somewhere in the grass. Summer music, Mary told herself as she turned the crank that spun the canister. What had once been a chore now felt like a warm-up for a welcome workout. She’d gone for a run early that morning, but she missed the gym. She wasn’t going to give up exercising no matter what. Her face was no prize, but she had a damn good body, and that wasn’t going away.

      She switched arms. The more resistance, the better the results.

      “What the hell is goin’ on?”

      Stop the music. Here comes Damn Tootin'. He was waving a piece of paper in one hand, an envelope in the other.

      “I just got a notice from the Bureau of Land Management, says I can’t run cattle in the hills west of Coyote Creek. Says they’re designating that area for wildlife. Designating for waste is what that means.”

      Mary flexed her fingers and stepped back from the ice cream freezer, which she’d set on a stool. “It’s so isolated, Father. Why can’t you just let it go?”