Chapter 8
WHEN SHE HAD STACKED THEIR FEW DISHES in the dishwasher after breakfast, made the bed, and enjoyed a moment in every one of the seven rooms in this delightful house with its Spanish decor, Zoe started her walk.
From the driveway that was now hers and Jock's, she surveyed the unbelievable scene, taking more time for it than she had when she got here last night. There was more to see in the glowing sunlight: more buildings, more activity, more elegant birds with their haughty struts than she had seen before. It was a ranch of wealth, of accomplishment, and of possible happiness.
There had been very little real happiness on these lovely acres up to now, she was sure. Perhaps she could help to develop a little of it for Link, as well as for Jock. Link was a good man-a great man-according to his son. He had carved this place out of rocks and crags with his bare hands, so to speak. And he had a heart, hidden away where he hoped nobody would ever glimpse it. It had shown up, in spite of his gruff exterior, when she had pleaded for her baby. "Even a devil like me can't throw out his own grandchild," he had said. But, God, he was no devil. He was a lonely, disillusioned man. She would help Jock be kind to him, let him know that she wanted to understand him and make his life more bearable.
Also, for herself, she wanted to learn to be less afraid of him-and less drawn toward touching him, toward wanting him to touch her. No woman should ever feel this kind of terror, or this kind of desire, for her father-in-law.
She walked down the wide white walks toward the mammoth pens. Beside the first one, she paused, admiring the roosters that were plainly what their name implied--The Fury, etched into brass plates in the exact center of every post on each side of each fence. God, Link was neat! There didn't seem to be a thing on the feather farm that was not precise, measured to the Nth inch, and set in its proper place. She had the feeling that every one of these proud birds knew his name and serial number, plus the count and weight and value of every feather he flaunted.
She made her way among the pens, loving the waving tail feathers, smiling at the way the birds eyed her as they cocked their haughty heads, blinked their piercing eyes, and strutted toward her defiantly. She was glad there was a fence between them and her as they scolded loudly, "Chut-chut-chut!" with every movement. When they began to poke their perfect beaks through the fence at her, her eyes traveled down their bodies to the spurs on their sturdy legs-spurs so sharp, by nature, breeding, and honing, that they could well deal death wherever they struck. Zoe felt chilly and cringy as she stared at the needle-like points that swelled into swords on the legs. She hoped she never had to watch a cock fight. She wanted no part of the flying feathers, the bleeding necks, the torn flesh, the dying bodies that had known such pride. Daddy had seen a cock fight once, and he'd told her about it. The description had haunted her for days. Now she was to have part of her income from such contests of life and death among birds. Fate played strange tricks as you lived it out.
Behind the pens, she found the buildings where the birds spent their nights-"chicken coop" would be an inadequate term to apply to these bird palaces. Made of the same gray stone as every structure on this place, the trim in bright red and blue, they looked clean enough for people to walk into and settle down for life.
Zoe opened a side door of one of the chicken houses and went inside. The floor was cement, white and shining and spotless. Weren't high-powered fighting cocks allowed to pee and grunt-or were they trained to make their messes in a special bird-toilet? Or-and she knew this was the most likely-did some hireling follow them about with a dust pan and a mop?
At the back of the building, she saw lines of built-ins, and doors that must lead to closets. She peeked into one of. them and saw a fair-sized room with a bunk that was neatly made up. There was a chair, a high desk, and a wall full of nude pin-ups. Staring at the lewd figures, she suddenly froze. There were no views of women; they were all of naked men! Why would a man, in a man's world, want to look at the sex organs of other males? Why indeed! God, she was stupid! Of course there would be homos among such fellows as the ones who worked here. Probably most of them were normal, and certainly Link screwed only women when he chose to screw; she'd stake her life on that. As for Jock, he had begun his sex life with her, and he had no time for anyone else ... So what the men who worked for Link did-well, it was none of her business.
All at once, she heard voices outside the building, coming closer, about to enter the chicken house. She had no business being here, and she wished she weren't. Maybe she could hide somewhere until these men left.-likely they'd do some cleaning or put out some feed or something ... She dropped quickly into a far corner, behind a neat stack of boxes and extra roosts that looked as if they wouldn't be disturbed right now.
She heard two pairs of feet on the concrete, two men's voices. They clomped across the whole area and into the bedroom at the back. But they didn't shut the door. God, Oh God, were they going to--?
Yes, they were, she could tell. She heard their clothes hitting the cement floor as they stripped, heard them kissing each other feverishly. God, why had she stayed here, to be humiliated by having to listen to two homos screw each other?
Why hadn't she let them see her, and just told them casually that she was looking over the birds, which was the truth? Now she would have to stay in her hiding place until they had spent themselves-until they had gloried in an abnormal sex act that was-likely their way of life in this womanless place.
They were loud about it, gloating over the one man's quickness in getting hard, the other's readiness to accept the stiffened prick. They fondled each other at great length, before one of them finally invited, "Okay, I'm on my stomach. Shove it into my blow-hole this time, honey." Then the squishing, in and out, echoed through the building, the sex partners gasping and groaning.
Zoe's watch read thirty minutes later when the men dressed and left ... She felt cramped from her long squatting in the same position, but she waited another ten munutes, wanting the men to be too far away to know that she had been here when they did their screwing. She wanted nobody to know it-nobody I She would not even tell Jock. And she would never come to any of the chicken houses again.
She stepped into the sunlight and started back between two of the pens. Suddenly she heard a sound behind her, and she whirled to face it-alarmed, without knowing why. A man stood there, looking at her with contempt and triumph in his black eyes, and a sneering familiarity on his brown Mexican face that came close to a look of possession.
She knew at once that he must be Mendez, and at first glance there seemed nothing sinister about him. He was dressed in an expensive whipcord suit, much like the ones Link and Jock wore here on the ranch, and his boots had the same gleam as theirs. His red silk shirt gave his dark face a handsome air; the trim mustache lent him a neatness, a preciseness that seemed exactly right for the foreman of Link Tawnley's Feather Farm.
But, under the smooth exterior of the man, there were other qualities that began to come through to her as she looked at him-lurking undercurrents that made her shrink back. His eyes mocked her, his lips curled, and the set of his shoulders was a swagger, a boast. She didn't like this kind of man, not at all. And she had the memory of his carrying on with Tutie Bear. She hated him on sight.
He spoke first, in the same insulting drawl that she had heard from the bedroom at Clitey's. "So here ees the Senora-Tawnley. The Senora Zoe, getting acquainted weeth the ranch. Senor Leenk, he tell me that you have come to leeve here. You like what you see in the bird house, Senora?"
She tossed back her head, trying to look nonchalant. "It's a very nice bird house."
"Ees so, Senora. The best. Senor Leenk he build always the best. But you come out here to see a show bigger than birds. Yes, senora? The two men, they come here every day to screw. I watch them often. So I know that you stay to watch them theese morning. Ees hell of good show, yes, senora?"
She felt her face burning, her body steaming. She didn't have to excuse herself to this ... this louse of a foreman. She didn't have to say a word. But she did anyway, offering the lame excuse, "I just came out here to look around. I was scared when the men came in and so I ... I hid. I thought they'd leave right away."
"But eet was good that they stay a while, yes? They geeve you good thrill to watch."
She flared, "Of course they didn't give me a thrill! If I need any sex education, I'll get it in my own bed, with my own husband."
"Oh, but yes-yes, certainly, senora. For sure you weel. And I envy Senor Jock. Eef you screw like Clitey, you screw damn good. I have layed Clitey, nights when I bet in her games. She ees real damn good. The best of any woman I ever had."
She snapped, "You stay away from me, Mendez. If you ever touch me, I'll-I'll kill you if Jock doesn't."
"Senor Jock ees not my boss, Senora Zoe."
"Well, Link won't let you threaten me either. I'm carrying his grandchild, and that's important to him.
That's why he's letting me stay here. He won't let you, or anybody else, harm my baby."
"Ees so, senora? You are sure that eet ees so?" The man's face was smug, leering. "Eef I tell you what I theenk, eet ees that Senor Leenk needs me more than anybody else on thees place. I theenk he weel not let me go for notheeng. I theenk eef he have to keel me or you, he weel keel you."
God, he was sure of himself! And he was probably right, damn it. Link would-likely let her go, and Jock and the baby with her, before he would fire Mendez.
The man added, "You know Senor Leenk hates women anyway, senora. like me, he wants no woman here. He would be glad for see you leave."
She said, very low, "Just stay away from me, Mendez. Stay clear away, all the time."
He bowed, clicking his heels, rattling the rocks under his shining boots. "But, yes, senora. Eef you do not weesh to give me good screw like Clitey, then I have no weesh to bother you. And love for you I have not, too. Eef you was not boss's son's wife, I would spit on you."
As she stared at him, open-mouthed in her welling, swelling anger, he went on coolly, "You stay a-way from me, senora. Theese bird house, they are my business. Weeth the birds you have no business at all. You stay your place, I stay mine."
She spun from him and walked on past the pens, as fast as she could. She hoped she never saw that hateful man again ...
That night at dinner she told Jock about her conversation with Mendez. He sighed, agreeing that all her loathing was understandable. But he repeated what Link had told him so many times, and his own conclusion was that Mendez' position with Link was secure, probably the most secure of any on the Tawnley Feather Farm.
Jock was elated over the new job that Link had assigned to him. He was to have charge of the gift factory, oversee the work, supervise the boxing of orders, and sometimes make trips when items were being introduced into new stores or towns. Link was doubling his salary, which had been more than adequate before, and Jock would be able to buy almost anything that Zoe wanted to ask for.
When he had worn himself out in her that night, making two climaxes with scarcely a rest between them, he held their bodies tightly together, pressing the limpness of him against the softness of her. He wanted to sleep raw tonight, he said. Maybe they would like the feeling of each other's nakedness in the bed together, and if they did, they'd sleep that way all the time. He wanted to feel of her boobies, touch her crotch, even in his sleep. And he wanted to wake up with her breasts in his mouth, with the whole glory of her body exposed to him.
He said, "I don't like to think about your getting all swollen up with the baby, honey. I'm going to resent that little scamp growing inside you, pooching you all out the way he will."
She kissed him. "Oh, you'll love watching him make me big, darling, even when he stretches me all out of shape. You'll be happy about it, because it will be your very own child, the one you planted in me that night at Clitey's."
"I know." His face brightened. "And maybe it will be a thrill to us. We'll feel him when he moves in your stomach, won't we?"
"Yes, darling, of course you will. You'll be able to put your hand on me and feel him kick."
"God, it kind of excites me just to think about it, honey." He felt her stomach, searching for a lump in the still flatness. "I'll stay right beside you when he's born, if they'll let me. I don't want us to have any more kids, because I don't want you to swell up again and get hurt when you have babies. So, I want to see this one come out of you. I never could under-stand how a woman could open up enough to give birth to a child. It seems like it would turn her inside-out, the baby pushing itself out of her."
Zoe sighed. What a child he was! But perhaps when he was a father, he would mature a little. His new job might help him too. He might grow up, one of these days. And he would be the man that she wanted him to be. She had to keep telling herself that he would.