When Earl noticed her hovering only a few feet away, he glanced at Isaac as if to say, Can’t you take care of her? I’m busy here. Then he seemed to realize who Reenie was, and sent Ray to Isaac instead.
Four months ago Isaac couldn’t have been much help to someone like Ray, who’d grown up on a ranch. When Isaac first started at the feed store, he hadn’t known enough about horses and cattle to do much more than run the register. But it hadn’t taken him long to learn.
Ray stopped halfway down the aisle to pick up a salt wheel. While waiting, Isaac breathed in the sweet smell of hay and grain that surrounded him, and realized that he was actually beginning to like Dundee. In a way, it reminded him of the jungle. Not the climate, of course. Because he had to step outdoors regularly, he wore long johns to work under his jeans and a heavy flannel shirt.
But things were simple here, and animals were an important part of life. In Chicago, he hadn’t taken the time to get to know a lot of people. The fact that he’d associated mostly with academics who, like him, spent all their energy pursuing their goals, made it more difficult to build deep relationships.
Here that sort of absorption and anonymity was virtually impossible. Everyone knew who he was and had something to say to him. At first they’d just wanted to express their indignation about what Keith had done, or appease their curiosity about the new guy in town. But soon they were sharing the problems they experienced with their animals and ranches—sometimes even their neighbors.
“Earl was telling me he thinks I should cut the starches and sugars in the feed for the dude horses,” Ray said, carrying the salt wheel under his arm as he sauntered closer.
“Why?” Isaac asked. “You still having trouble with laminitis?”
Ray nodded.
“Has the vet been out?”
“Once, but I knew what it was. You can see the inflammation around their hooves.”
“You’ll have to watch that, huh?”
“Wouldn’t want it to lead to founder.”
“Exactly.”
“So what do you suggest as far as diet?” he asked.
Isaac couldn’t help feeling gratified by the question. Slowly his opinion was coming to mean something, even to tough old cowboys like Ray. “Have you tried the high-fiber cube?”
“Not yet.”
“It’s got palm kernal, oat feed, wheat feed, grass meal, soya hulls, wheat. With the added vitamins and minerals, it’s a real good feed. It may help.”
“Worth a try, I suppose.” Ray took a can of chew from his back pocket and put a pinch of tobacco between his teeth and gums. “Give me a half-dozen bags, will ya?”
Isaac went after the feed while the Running Y’s foreman talked about his latest hand-tooled saddle, which he was trying to finish in time for the rodeo this summer. Isaac responded appropriately, but he wasn’t paying much attention. He was too busy trying to hear what Reenie was saying to Earl.
“But I’m afraid she’s getting fat,” she said.
“Have you noticed changes in her crest, neck or shoulders?” Earl asked.
“It’s tough to tell. I haven’t had her long enough.”
“Do you have a measuring tape?”
“Yes.”
“When you get home, measure the length of her from the point of her shoulder to the point of her buttock.”
“Jemima’s buttock?” Isabella laughed. “Is that her butt? Her butt’s really b-i-g!”
Isaac grinned as he shifted one sack of Ray’s feed onto his shoulder and carried it to the register. He enjoyed seeing Reenie and her children’s excitement over owning a horse. But he thought she had to be crazy to take on the farm and so many animals when her life was so upside down. Judging from the way her clothes were beginning to hang on her, he doubted she was finding time to take care of herself. Maybe her horse was getting fat, but Reenie was losing weight.
He collected Ray’s money while Earl explained to Reenie that she’d also need to measure the heart girth of her horse in order to use the mathematical formula that determined body weight. “Once you know what she weighs, give me a call,” he said. “I’ve got a chart here that’ll tell us right where she should fall.”
“Do you think I should switch her to a leaner feed, just in case?” she asked.
“Not yet. Give her a little more exercise, if you can. Once you know her weight, we’ll determine if we need to change her feed.”
“Okay.” Reenie sighed as though the world rested on her shoulders, and Isaac couldn’t help glancing over at her again. He’d admired her when she was Keith’s wife. But now he respected her. As difficult as it must’ve been to have Liz, Mica and Christopher move to town, she’d behaved admirably. She hadn’t tried to make their lives miserable by encouraging her friends to turn against the newcomers. She hadn’t stipulated that Keith couldn’t see the children—though Lord knows Keith probably would have stayed away had Reenie held out any hope that she might come back to him if he did.
As far as Isaac knew, Reenie hadn’t done anything petty or mean. According to Mica, who sometimes saw her at school, she even waved occasionally.
For the most part, Reenie’s coping mechanism seemed to be avoidance. Which was most likely why she’d never responded to his e-mails. Even the one about Bailey.
“Look, Mom, there’s Christopher’s uncle!” Isabella said.
Reenie’s eyes met Isaac’s, then jerked away. Pretending she didn’t hear her daughter, she tried to pull the little girl along as she followed Earl to the pallet of feed she wanted. But Isabella managed to wriggle away. A moment later, she came running over to the register. “Hi!”
Isaac thought he saw real annoyance cross Reenie’s face, but he grinned in spite of it. Or maybe he grinned because of it. Certainly being in her town added a spark of excitement to his life. “What’s up?” he asked Isabella.
“My dog’s sick again.” The corners of her small mouth turned down in a worried frown. “He lies there all day. Mom says his joints hurt too much for him to move.”
“I’m afraid dogs don’t live as long as people do,” he said.
“I know.” Her voice dropped. “Do you think he’s going to die soon?”
Isaac didn’t want to upset her. But he saw no point in lying about something so inevitable. “He could. Maybe you should be prepared for it, just in case. He’s old, like your mother said.”