Cimarron · Chapter 14 (2/2)

Her wealthy Cousin Bella French Vian, visiting the World’s Fair in Chicago, had sent it from Marshall Field’s store. It consisted of a blue serge skirt, cut wide and flaring at the hem but snug at the hips; a waist-length blue serge Eton jacket trimmed with black soutache braid; and a garment called a shirtwaist to be worn beneath the jacket. But astounding⁠—revolutionary⁠—as all this was, it was not the thing that caused the eyes of feminine Osage to bulge with envy and despair. The sleeves! The sleeves riveted the attention of those present, to the utter neglect of “Whither Oklahoma?” The balloon sleeve now appeared for the first time in the Oklahoma Territory, sponsored by Mrs. Yancey Cravat. They were bouffant, enormous; a yard of material at least had gone into each of them. Every woman present was, in her mind, tearing to rag strips, bit by bit, every gown in her own scanty wardrobe.

Sabra returned home, flushed, elated. She entered by way of the newspaper office, seeking Yancey’s approval. Curtseying and dimpling she stood before him. She wanted him to see the new costume before she must thriftily take it off for the preparation of supper. Yancey’s comment, as she pirouetted for his approval, infuriated her.

“Good God! Sleeves! Let the squaws see those and they’ll be throwing away their papoose boards, and using the new fashion for carrying their babies, one in each sleeve.”

“They’re the very latest thing in Chicago. Cousin Bella French Vian wrote that they’ll be even fuller than this, by autumn.”

“By autumn,” echoed Yancey. He held in his hand a slip of paper. Later she knew that it was a telegram⁠—one of the few telegraphic messages which the Wigwam’s somewhat sketchy service received. He was again completely oblivious of the new costume, the balloon sleeves. “Listen, sugar. President Cleveland’s just issued a proclamation setting September sixteenth for the opening of the Cherokee Strip.”

“Cherokee Strip?”

“Six million, three hundred thousand acres of Oklahoma land to be opened for white settlement. The government has bought it from the Cherokees. It was all to be theirs⁠—all Oklahoma. Now they’re pushing them farther and farther out.”

“Good thing,” snapped Sabra, still cross about the matter of Yancey’s indifference to her costume. Indians. Who cared! She raised her arms to unpin her hat.

Yancey rose from his desk. He turned his rare full gaze on her, his handsome eyes aglow. “Honey, let’s get out of this. Clubs, sleeves, church suppers⁠—God! Let’s get our hundred and sixty acre allotment of Cherokee Strip land and start a ranch⁠—raise cattle⁠—live in the open⁠—ride⁠—this town life is no good⁠—it’s hideous.”

Her arms fell, leaden, to her side. “Ranch? Where?”

“You’re not listening. There’s to be a new Run. The Cherokee Strip Opening. You know. You wrote news stories about it only last week, before the opening date had been announced. Let’s go, Sabra. It’s the biggest thing yet. The 1889 Run was nothing compared to it. Sell the Wigwam, take the children, make the Run, get our hundred and sixty, start a ranch, stock up with cattle and horses, build a ranch house and patio; in the saddle all day⁠—”

“Never!” screamed Sabra. Her face was distorted. Her hands were clutching the air, as though she would tear to bits this plan of his for the future. “I won’t. I won’t go. I’d rather die first. You can’t make me.”

He came to her, tried to take her in his arms, to pacify her. “Sugar, you won’t understand. It’s the chance of a lifetime. It’s the biggest thing in the history of Oklahoma. When the Territory’s a state we’ll own forever one hundred and sixty acres of the finest land anywhere. I know the section I want.”

“Yes. You know. You know. You knew the last time, too. You let that slut⁠—that hussy⁠—take it away from you⁠—or you gave it to her. Go and take her with you. You’ll never make me go. I’ll stay here with my children and run the paper. Mother! Cim! Donna!”

She had a rare and violent fit of hysterics, after which Yancey, aided clumsily by Arita Red Feather, divested her of the new finery, quieted the now screaming children, and finally restored to a semblance of suppertime order the household into which he had hurled such a bomb. Felice Venable herself, in her heyday, could not have given a finer exhibition of Marcy temperament. It was intended, as are all hysterics (no one ever has hysterics in private), to intimidate the beholder and fill him with remorse. Yancey was properly solicitous, tender, charming, as only he could be. From the shelter of her husband’s arms Sabra looked about the cosy room, smiled wanly upon her children, bade Arita Red Feather bring on the belated supper. “That,” thought Sabra to herself, bathing her eyes, smoothing her hair, and coming pale and wistful to the table, her lip quivering with a final effective sigh, “settles that.”

But it did not. September actually saw Yancey making ready to go. Nothing that Sabra could say, nothing that she could do, served to stop him. She even negotiated for a little strip of farm land outside the town of Osage and managed to get Yancey to make a payment on it, in the hope that this would keep him from the Run. “If it’s land you want you can stay here and farm the piece at Tuskamingo. You can raise cattle on it. You can breed horses on it.”

Yancey shook his head. He took no interest in the farm. It was Sabra who saw to the erection of a crude little farmhouse, arranged for the planting of such crops as it was thought that land would yield. It was very near the Osage Reservation land and turned out, surprisingly enough, doubtless owing to some mineral or geological reason (they knew why, later), to be fertile, though the Osage land so near by was barren and flinty.

“Farm! That’s no farm. It’s a garden patch. D’you think I’m settling down to be a potato digger and chicken feeder, in a hayseed hat and manure on my boots!”

September, the month of the opening of the vast Cherokee Strip, saw him well on his way. Cim howled to be taken along, and would not be consoled for days.

Sabra’s farewell was intended to be cold. Her heart, she told herself, was breaking. The change that these last four years had made in her never was more apparent than now.

“You felt the same way when I went off to the first Run,” Yancey reminded her. “Remember? You carried on just one degree less than your mother. And if I hadn’t gone you’d still be living in the house in Wichita, with your family smothering you in Southern fried chicken and advice.” There was much truth in this, she had to admit. She melted; clung to him.

“Yancey! Yancey!”

“Smile, sugar. Wait till you see Cim and Donna, five years from now, riding the Cravat acres.”

After all, a hundred other men in Osage were going to make the Cherokee Strip Run. The town⁠—the whole Territory⁠—had talked of nothing else for months.

She dried her eyes. She even managed a watery smile. He was making the Run on a brilliant, wild-eyed mare named Cimarron, with a strain of Spanish in her for speed and grace, and a strain of American mustang for endurance. He had decided to make the trip from Osage to the Cherokee Outlet on horseback by easy stages so as to keep the animal in condition, though the Santa Fe and the Rock Island roads were to run trains into the Strip. He made a dashing, a magnificent figure as he sat the strong, graceful animal that now was pawing and pirouetting to be off. Though a score of others were starting with him, it was Yancey that the town turned out to see. He rode in his white sombrero, his fine white shirt, his suit with the Prince Albert coat, his glittering high-heeled Texas star boots with the gold-plated spurs. The start was made shortly after sunrise so as to make progress before the heat of the day. But a cavalcade awoke them before dawn with a rat-a-tat-tat of six-shooters and a bloodcurdling series of cowboy yips. The escort rode with Yancey and the others for a distance out on the Plains. Sabra, at the last minute, had the family horse hitched to the buggy, bundled Cim and Donna in with her, and⁠—Isaiah hanging on behind, somehow⁠—the prim little vehicle bumped and reeled its way over the prairie road in the wake of the departing adventurers.

At the last Sabra threw the reins to Isaiah, sprang from the buggy, ran to Yancey as he pulled up his horse. He bent far over in his saddle, picked her up in one great arm, held her close while he kissed her long and hard.

“Sabra, come with me. Let’s get clear away from this.”

“You’ve gone crazy! The children!”

“The children, too. All of us. Come on. Now.” His eyes were blazing. She saw that he actually meant it. A sudden premonition shook her.

“Where are you going? Where are you going?”

He set her down gently and was off, turned halfway in his saddle to face her, his white sombrero held aloft in his hand, his curling black locks tossing in the Oklahoma breeze.

Five years passed before she saw him again.