The Daughter by C.B. Cooper (robert munsch read aloud .TXT) 📕

and badly in need of repair. She had tried to spruce the room up a bit. Yellowed lace curtains framed the two broken windows, a dresser stood on the side wall, an old ornate mirror hung above it. Most of the glass was speckled black from where the silver coating was peeling off the back, and the gold gilding on the frame was crackled and flaking off in spots. The dresser top held a pitcher and bowel for washing up, a small picture frame that Sharp was too far away to see who was in it, and various bottles and jars of god knows what, probably girly stuff, which he knew absolutelynothing about- perfume, powder, make-up, and some such. A kerosene lantern hung from a peg by the door, and a hand woven rag rug graced the rough pine floor.
Picturing Libby living in this cramped shit hole day after day, made Sam sad. She was so beautiful and had so much potential, he figured it was about the equivelent of taking a fine racehorse and sticking it in front a sharecroppers plow. Sure, it could plod along, day after day, tilling up the sod as good as any old nag, but if it just had half a chance, it would be winning races on the track, living the high life and being pampered and praised by it’s prominent owners. If Libby were to go to a big city, men would be lining up to pay top dollar for her services. Sharp frowned, he didn’t like that idea either. God, what was wrong with him!

Sharp watched Libby walk across the bedroom, her supple body moving gracefully to a small table that held a glass pitcher of cool water. They had spent the night making slow tender, love- instead of the carnal coupling he had had in mind. Due to the injuries from the damn fight, they had to be real careful. He was pretty sure that at least one of his ribs were cracked, but luckily his nose wasn’t broke like he had originally thought, just banged up a little.
He was laying on his back, fingers laced together under his head, when he finally asked the question that had been bugging him. “Why are you here, Libby?”
After taking a drink, she set the glass down slowly and turned unabashed to face him in all her glory. “That’s an odd question, especially since your in my room.”
He smiled warmly at her and then let his graze slide down her naked body. God she was beautiful. “What I mean is, why are you here, in this town?”
She walked back to him, crawled up on the bed and straddled his hips gently. Her long golden hair fell down to cover her breasts, so Sharp brushed the locks back to afford himself a better view. Girls in Libby’s profession were anything but shy, one more reason why he preferred them over the common woman, they never tried to hide who they were, they just layed it all out for you to peruse, without all the silly, shy coyness of a proper lady.
As he looked into those smokey blue eyes, an unusual feeling washed over him. What was it? More than lust… more than caring… affection maybe? He groaned out loud, was he starting to have feelings for her? No! Shit.
Libby misinterpreted his groan of self-loathing for one of desire, and started moving her hips in slow inticing circles.
Sam squeezed his eyes shut and ground his teeth together as she ran her fingers lightly up his stomach to his bare chest. “I thought you’d be all played out after last night.”
He blew out the breath he’d been holding in a loud rush. This wasn’t going as planned. What he wanted, was to know more about her, as insane as that sounded. Why did he have to get injured? If he could of just took her the way he wanted, none of these stupid feelings would be sneaking up on him.
This was all Zeb’s fault somehow, he just knew it.
“I think I do feel sort of drained,” he admitted.
She gave him a sympathetic smile. “Poor baby,” she purred. “Just let me know when your ready, Cowboy,” she said as she slid off to lay beside him. Reaching over to the bedside table she snagged a cigarette and a box of matches. Lighting the end she inhaled and exhaled, blowing out a small cloud of pungent smoke, then she offered it to him.
Sharp reached for it, “I’m already bound for hell, so I might as well live it up.”
She laughed as she curled into his side, laying her head on his shoulder, “Your going to hell for smoking a little tobacco?’
“No,” he said as he blew out a puff of smoke, “I’m going to hell for lots of things. This,” he said, waving the small cigarette, “Is just one more log to throw on the fire.”
“You are not going to hell,” she chided. “Only evil people wind up in hell, and you, Sam Sharp, are not an evil man.”
He smiled down into her lovely face, wiggling his eyebrows up and down in a dastardly fashion, “And how do you know that, my little buttercup?” he teased.
“Oh, I can just tell. I’ve seen evil before honey, and you might have a dark side in there somewhere, but your not evil.”
She kissed his rough cheek, liking the feel of the prickley whiskers against her soft lips, “Besides, you have the gentlest green eyes I’ve ever seen.”
Sam chuckled with flattery, “Well, there’s only one way to find out for sure where I’m heading, and I plan on postponing that meeting for as long as I can.”
He turned his attention to a large oil painting on the wall. It was a painting of a quaint cottage house, surrounded by beautiful flowers, arbors full of pink and yellow wild roses. Smoke curled out the top of a rock chimney, and the windows glowed with a soft yellow light from within. It was the one piece in the whole room that didn’t scream squalor, and it made him curious.
“Where did you get that painting, Libby?”
She turned to study the picture in question. “Why, do you like it?”
“Yeah, its very pretty.”
“I painted it.”
Sam was stunned, “You painted that?”
“Yes, I did. It’s a picture of my father’s house, before my mother passed away,” she sighed sadly, “It doesn’t look like that anymore though. The yards mostly just dirt and weeds now, the roof of the house sags in the middle, and all of those beautiful arbors have fallen down.”
Sam was still trying to wrap his head around Libby being the painter. “My god, Libby. You could move away from here and become a painter with all of your talent,”
Nodding toward the picture, he said, “People would pay good money for one of those to hang in their parlors, and you would’nt have to do… this for a living.”
She rolled over and studied his green eyes closely, “Do you think I like doing this day after day?” she laughed mirthlessly, “Believe me, if I had the choice, I would move far away from here.”
Sharp frowned, “But, why couldn’t you?”
She pointed back to the picture sadly, “That’s why. Even though the house is practically falling down now, my father still lives there.”
Her eyes were so sad, he wanted to pull her close and hug her hard. He wanted to make her feel better and wipe the pain from her eyes, but he didn’t, instead he asked, “He wouldn’t leave and go with you, now that your mother’s gone?”
Libby shook her head. “He built that house with his own two hands for my mother. Every stick and stone was placed with love. He would never leave it, or her. She’s buried on a small hill behind the house and he visits her everyday.” She took a deep, shaky breath before continuing, “He’s dying. He’ll never admit it, but I see it in his eyes. Like a candle that gets dimmer as the wick burns low, the lights are slowly fading. Every week when I go out to visit and bring him the groceries, I’m afraid of what I’ll find, or wont find, when I get there. I don’t want him to die, he’s all the family I have left, but some days I almost wish he would just go. He’s so lonely without her. He’s suffering.”
“He must have loved her very much.”
“Yes, he did,” she whispered softly, wistfully, “Not many people find love like theirs.”
Sam grunted through the pain as he rolled towards her. Stroking the side of her pretty face with his rough thumb, he said, “Love is a rare commodity, indeed.”
* *
“What’s eatin’ you?”
Sharp wiped the sweat off the back of his neck with a hankerchief, “Nothing.”
They had been on the trail most of the day, and Sharp was busy keeping a watchful eye out, trying to find a good spot for them to bed down for the night.
“Don’t you ‘nothing’, me. You’ve been actin’ funny all day, boy.”
Sharp didn’t want to talk about it, so he kept his mouth shut. Besides, his bruised ribs were killing him, even though Libby had carefully bound him up tight for the trip, all the jostling in the saddle was taking it’s toll.
Libby.
Zeb studied him carefully before breaking out into a toothy grin. “Wall, don’t tell me you went an fell for the chippy!”
“Shut up.”
“You did!” he laughed. “Oh, I wouldn’t worry to much about it, son, it happens to the best of us every once in a while. Especially when it comes to ones as pretty as yer Miss Libby.”
Sam did not want to talk about Libby. “How did Bob know I was in town yesterday?” Sam asked abruptly, his voice full of accusation.
“Yeah, about that… I might ’a mentioned somethin’ about you to my friend, Ned, at the mercantile.”
Sam laughed harshly, “Of course you did! Why is it, you can’t follow simple god-damned instructions. All I asked was that you call me by another name, was it really that hard to remember?”
Zeb frowned, “Wall, I’m sorry, but ya don’t have to get all bent out of shape about it. If‘n you remember, you made the same mistake in the bar.”
“I just can’t trust you at all!” He yelled, then seeing the hurt look on the old mans face, he immediately regretted what he’d said. Damnit! It wasn’t really Zeb that he was mad at anyway, it was himself. Why did he have to go and fall in love with her.
Love? Where did that come from? Goddamnit!
Zeb had trotted ahead after he had yelled at him, now Sharp gigged his horse to catch up, the added jostle felt like he was being stabbed in the ribs with every bounce. “Zeb, I’m sorry too. It wasn’t all your fault.” he said, trying to lighten the mood, “Hell, if I hadn’t slept with that ugly woman all those years ago, none of it would have happened.”
Zeb tried to keep the hurt look on his face, but a smile slowly crept up, “Boy, ugly is right. If you stuck her next to Ol’ Ugly here, you’d have a hard time figurin’ out which one to mount…and which one to stick a saddle on!”
Both men laughed.
Zeb’s eyes crinkled in the corners as he smiled, “I hadn’t realized until I seen her, how big of a drunk you really were.” he teased. “But I was serious when I said not to feel bad about fallin’ fer Libby. That there is one hell of a fine gal. Deserves more than what she’s got,