The Baby Season. Alice Sharpe

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СКАЧАТЬ unsettled the jittery new mother horse, who snorted, stamped a foot and turned in her stall. The baby whinnied and turned, too.

      Jack caught the child and swung her up on his hip. “Shh,” he said. “You’re frightening Goldy.”

      “And the baby,” the child said with a lisp.

      “Yes, and the baby.”

      “Is that mine?” she asked, pointing at the pink box in Jack’s hand.

      “Yes, but not until your party.”

      The little girl finally noticed Roxanne. She buried her head against her father’s shoulder, revealing just one blue eye, which she fixed on Roxanne’s face.

      Roxanne smiled and the child completely buried her head. Roxanne wasn’t surprised. This was not only her first experience with a small horse, but also with a small human. She’d probably frightened the poor little thing.

      “This is my daughter, Ginny,” Jack said, looking from Roxanne to his child. “Ginny, this lady’s name is Roxanne.”

      “Hello, Ginny,” Roxanne said in her best put-a-child-at-ease voice. “Is it your birthday?”

      Ginny pushed her head away from her father’s chest and produced a grin that looked just like her father’s. “Yes,” she said holding up three pudgy fingers.

      Jack said, “Hey, pumpkin, how are Aggie’s puppies doing?”

      “Good.”

      He tickled her and she wiggled to the ground. With another shy glance up at Roxanne, the child said, “Wanna see?”

      “The puppies?” Roxanne said.

      “No.” Pressing one small finger against her lips and whispering, she added, “It’s a secret.”

      Roxanne felt like scratching her head. The puppies were a secret? From whom?

      “I think I know what she means,” Jack said as they both watched the little girl make her way across the barn to an empty stall, glancing back over her shoulder at them periodically. “Follow me,” he added.

      Jack walked into an empty stall, Roxanne right behind him, watching her step. The straw might look innocent, but she’d found it poked at her tender city toes if she stepped on it wrong. Ginny was halfway up a stack of bales, scrambling at such a pace it was obvious she was experienced at this kind of thing. Jack climbed a couple, and reaching down, took Roxanne’s hand and pulled her up beside him. She teetered a second, and his grip tightened. A totally unexpected shiver ran up her arm.

      “You okay?”

      “Just not used to climbing around in the hay.”

      “Shall I keep hold of your hand or are you steady now?”

      “Oh, I’m steady,” she said as he dropped her hand. The truth was that she was anything but. His touch had spurted up her arm like a fizzing fuse. She was loathe to have him take his hand away, but even more concerned that he should sense this.

      What was going on? She felt kind of dizzy. Perhaps it was the effects of dehydration.

      They climbed up beside Ginny who motioned for Roxanne and her dad to take a look. Roxanne peered over Ginny’s bent head into a crevice formed between the bales, and found six faces staring back.

      Kittens.

      One orange, two black, a gray-and-white, a pure white and a tabby. Little meows. Tiny little pink tongues and blurry bluish eyes.

      “Go ahead, touch one,” Jack said as he gently stroked a tiny white-and-pink ear.

      “Oh, I couldn’t,” Roxanne said. They looked far too fragile to touch. Jack seemed to know what he was doing, but his finger looked huge next to the kitten’s head.

      Pointing at each kitten in turn, Ginny said, “Blinky and Fuzzy and Foggy and Casper and Blackie and George.”

      Just then, the mother cat appeared at Ginny’s elbow and jumped down into the crevice. As she flopped onto her side, the kittens, meowing in earnest now, jockeyed for position until everyone was lined up with their own nipple and settled in for lunch.

      The cat, purring, began bathing her offspring.

      “Isn’t motherhood something?” Jack said.

      “I wouldn’t know,” Roxanne mumbled. Motherhood wasn’t something she spent a lot of time thinking about. Out of nowhere, she heard Kevin’s voice again, telling her this very thing just four days earlier.

      Jack turned his attention to his daughter. “Okay, sweet-pea, time to leave Flossy and her babies alone. And remember, don’t tell Aggie.”

      “’Cause it’s a secret.”

      “That’s right.”

      As Ginny scrambled down the stack, Roxanne said, “The kittens are a secret from the dog?”

      He shrugged. “Not really, but little kids love secrets.”

      Ginny was back on the floor within seconds, Jack right after her, Roxanne slowly following. Jack took her hand again and steadied her last few steps to the ground.

      By now, Ginny was running out the door. Jack released Roxanne’s hand. She gestured for him to go after his daughter, happy to have a moment to collect what was left of her wits.

      “That Ginny is one sweet little kid, isn’t she?” Carl said, emerging from a stall with a bucket of grain.

      Roxanne jumped at the sound of his voice—she hadn’t realized he was still in the barn. “What? Oh, yes. Adorable.” For a second, she thought of the little pink-and-blond child and actually felt a smile tug at her lips. She’d had no idea little girls were so…well, cute.

      Vaguely uncomfortable with her gut reaction to Carl’s remark, she added, “Carl, have you lived out here long?”

      “All my life.”

      “Ever hear of a woman called Dolly Aames? She’d be about sixty now. I know she lived in this area forty or so years ago. Maybe right here in this very house.”

      He straightened up and scratched his fleshy chin. “The Wheeler family has been here longer than that,” he said. “Jack’s grandfather built the house. Sorry, but I don’t remember anyone by that name ever living here.”

      It was getting to be a familiar refrain. “Thanks, anyway. Jack said I could use the phone.”

      “Sure thing. Come on into the house,” Carl said.

      As she hobbled across the yard beside Carl, she said, “This place is really beautiful.”

      “It is nice,” he said with a fond smile. “’Course, what with Doc’s schedule, all the heavy work falls to me and the other hands, but that’s the way I like it. Been here long enough now that the place feels like home. Know what I mean?”

      She СКАЧАТЬ