Wanted

Chapter 12

The man from the livery in Salesville came to collect John all too soon after lunchtime.

Walls and his wife hadn't been able to tell him much about the couple, because they were new in town, as were a lot of other people in those days. They knew that Edwards and his wife had arrived a few months ago and opened a livery right next to the post office and the merchant. They knew he was a saddler by trade and she, a seamstress who was planning to open a little business not only selling the clothes she made to measure but also cloth and dress material, ribbons, yarn, buttons and whatever else women needed to sew the clothing for their families. The woman's frail health apparently had delayed that venture so far.

"Ingenious," Sally told her husband with excitement in her voice letting everyone know she could hardly wait. "Imagine having such a shop close by," she said and then explained what it would mean to her and her daughter, being able to go into the shop and chose the items they wished to purchase themselves instead of having to wait for her husband to make the annual trip to the city to get her what she needed.

They had been introduced to them at church by the pastor last Christmas, Walls told him. The snow was high, he recounted, but they still went to church using their sleigh. John never been on a sleigh. He'd been to church on Christmas though. His mother didn't bring them often, but she did on Christmas. 

The church in Salesville was too far away to go to every week, Walls explained but once a month and on those important occasions they tried to go, if at all possible.

"You'll see us in church not every week but at least once a month," Walls told John in an attempt to calm the boy's nerves and pacify his own children who as it turned out were annoyed with him for not inviting John to stay.

They said nothing of course. They knew better, but they scowled at their father, so that John almost felt sorry for the man. John didn't dislike the rancher and his wife, and would have liked the friendship of his children to continue, but he was glad nevertheless that Walls did not claim him for himself. He knew he'd clash with the strict man in no time if he outstayed his welcome.

In that he wasn't all that much unlike McManus or the fathers on those other two farms he had been sent to. They weren't exactly monsters, just extremely strict. They expected him to do as he was told and to work hard. They weren't cruel, didn't take pleasure in hurting him, not like the blacksmith was, but any misbehaviour or idleness was harshly punished. It just was. All work and no play for him. Unlike Walls and McManus however they did not care. Not in the slightest which had him realise that the thought that he would see Walls once every so often was oddly comforting, despite having known him for only just the one day. It also made him realise that he was terrified of what lay ahead of him. There was nothing worse than not knowing and having no control over it.

"Is that him?" the man asked Walls, looking down at John without getting down off his buggy. He sounded stern but John couldn't suss him out because he could not hold the man's inspecting gaze. He had to lower his eyes. Walls who stood behind John with both his hands cupped firmly around the top of his shoulders nodded. "Yes, this is John, Mr Edwards," he replied as if he was selling him a prized bull.

John couldn't help but feel that Walls' tone of voice was completely misplaced, and he could see by the way the man scrutinised him from up on his seat felt the same. John was sure that among Walls' children he looked like the runt of the litter, with his skinny frame and sickly white skin against his raven black hair. It was one of the things that the farmers at the viewings liked to point out to their wives as they moved along down the line, "the sun would fry him like a slice of bacon in a pan out on the field." And they were not wrong. He never went brown, always pink. He felt as if he was back on that stage, hoping to get picked while at the same time also hoping to be yet again left behind.