Out West Ch. 03: Martha Anderson

Ah, Martha! So often, as I have tried to pen this memoir, I have stopped here. How to tell the story of Martha Anderson?

Where Kate, myself and darling Emma were all in some ways cut from the same timber, Martha was the oak itself. Tall, even by the standards of a man, she must have been six feet plus in her prime, and as dependable and solid as the oak, Martha defies description. Even comparing her to an oak would have produced from her self-critical comments about her appearance. I don' t think she ever understood why her Jacob, myself, Emma and Kate all loved her. She wasn't that sort of woman. And then there were the demons I caught behind those wide grey eyes. I first saw it on that train that day, but did not know what it meant.

It was this state of not knowing which made me stop here so often and then, darling Emma found Martha's journal, which my collaborator SerradaC has transcribed. It so captures her - and stops me having to explain who Emma is.

I never knew her full backstory, and even Emma, who knew, and was, part of it, was moved as she and I sat and read it the other evening. Oh we miss her, but that great spirit waits for us the other side of veil.

And so, let us begin with Martha's own account, which starts with her memory of that fateful journey but, in characteristic manner, wanders to and fro in time. Martha told things her own way, and it would be to change her to change that.

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[From Martha's Journal]

'God in Heaven I hate being on a train! And all these filthy tenderfeet ain't making it better!'

Pardon me, but after so long with only my own company to keep, I have a tendency not to distinguish between internal monologue and my writing. I guess if it was one of my students, I'd spank her. But let's not go there - yet.

I was at New York's Grand Central. I had not wanted to be there. I had not wanted to leave Missourah, or Emma, or the homestead. But heck, there were so many things of later I'd not wanted, so a train journey which at least took me back home was better than the one that brought me to this godforsaken city.

Those bastard lawyers were still trying to keep all Jacob's money locked up. Cheapest fare was all I could afford on the pittance I received. That was why I had come to New York, to their Head Office. I had got somewhere, further than my usual trips to St Louis, but not as far as I wanted.

They had argued and fussed and bellyached:

"We have no proof he is dead!"

My response was the same as to the St Louis vultures:

"Well you seen the letter from his commander, you know he went to Gettysburg and he never returned, do you expect he decided to become a tree? They didn't hand out death certificates you know! Do you want me to scour the field to find his bones, an' then you can say there weren't his?"

Must have been the look on my face, but hey eventually gave up and gave me something; just enough to tide me over till planting. They promised to send more via St Louis - lawyer scum. I'd believe it when it jingled in my bag.

Was I ever going to get what Jacob and I had worked so hard for? The thought of Jacob and our life together always brought me close to tears. He was handsome, bold and so full of life. He grew up in Tennessee to a wealthy family, but he had gone to Europe for an education and came back hating slavery. He had quarrelled with his grandfather, been written out of the will - or so he was told. He packed up and went north to Saint Louis, then struck west but only got as far as Jefferson City when something caught his eye.

I smiled as I remembered the handsome young man who had caught me before I had stepped in front of a livery wagon. My nose had been so stuck in a book that I had completely missed the danger. The gallant action as much as his brilliant smile had been the beginning of our courtship, our romance, and finally our lives together. Our union drew little attention. I was an orphan spinster school teacher, and he was a handsome but disinherited, penniless Harvard and Oxford trained young lawyer.

We had taken our little savings from teaching, and what he could earn, and bought some land out near the town of Marion. He practised law in Jefferson City much of the year, but we worked the land when we could. Finally, when we were comfortable, we had built a grand house right on the bluffs above the Missouri. Every morning the sun rose through glass windows in my sewing room, he would sit with me and read the paper a day or two old.

Clouds gathered as he read about the troubles over Lincoln and slavery. I remembered the anguish in his eyes when he got the letter years before about his grandfather's death, then the next year an outbreak of cholera took his mother and father too. Worse was the realization that being the oldest surviving son, he was now a slave owner - a thing he despised.

The thought did bring a bit of a smile to my face in spite of it all. If I had all the legacy, I might not have needed boarders, which meant I would never have met Emma. Into every darkened day a little light.

"If it were not for these fool lawyers, I would not spend good money on a blasted train to travel half-way across the continent to get what was mine!"

I caught myself thinking, 'who is that woman talking?' then realised, 'tarnation it is me!' I glanced around to see if anyone else noticed, and sure enough I got a few slant eyed glances, while some turned away. I'd only gone and done it again. I really needed to concentrate. They'd probably got me down as some mad old biddy. Well after that war, there were a lot of us about in Missourah.

'At least Emma was at the end of this fool's errand', I thought, smiling to myself, and my bed would be warm. I could feel my cheeks redden.

'Ah Martha you are too old for that foolishness.' I could just hear Jacob say those words in my head, the only place I would ever hear them now. I felt a tear run down my cheek.

Trying to distract myself I shifted my stuff to move it before the journey began. Being the delicate flower, that I am, I managed to kick the damned package, causing it to clank hard against the support. I felt myself wince, 'Well that will leave a mark on something. Cheap bastards had not even included decent packaging. Probably kept it if it came that way from back East.'

The bag had my new iron, the ones I hoped would bring in a little more money and keep me and Em safe incase everything went to hell. I had bet everything on two brand new Winchester 1873s, two short barrelled Colts, and one custom Sharp's buffalo gun, all together worth more than a year's pay to a couple good hands. I reckoned more than one bastard might try to help his self to my treasures, so my thigh was sweaty from the holster and heavy Navy Colt it carried.

I hated the gun. It was the one that I had used to kill a horse thief. He was my first victim I suppose. Just a scared boy, no more than sixteen, trying to desert the Union and get back to Iowa. I didn't know, all I saw was a body, my mule and a glint I thought was a gun. Emma and I took care of him till he passed; we buried him under the oak tree. Something you never forget, and the eyes I sometimes see in the darkest of my dreams.

The evening we buried the boy, Emma found me elbows deep in the wash basin, she had watched me draw water in the kitchen, Jacob had insisted that a pump be put right in our kitchen like in one of those fancy houses in Saint Louis.

"No going out to draw water in the snow for you." He had said, I loved him for it, even though it was a horrible expense.

Emma watched me draw it, heat it on the stove, she watched me not once, not twice but three times, watched me draw it, fill the big laundry kettle, then watched me lug into the washroom in back, I was naked from the waist up, and soaking wet from the waist down. She came in the washroom and found me scrubbing and crying. My hands was raw from scrubbing. I had washed away the digging dirt, but dirt weren't the problem.

I felt her arms around my waist, her gentle kisses on my back, sudsy water running down my breasts along with a river of tears, "it won't come off!" I kept sayin' as I scrubbed. "I wash and I wash but it won't come off!" My legs must have given out on me, how little Emma got me to bed I don't know, all I recall was her kissin' me the entire way.

"I know darling, it was not your fault."

Her voice gentle and soft, as always, it calmed me right down. She stripped me of the little I had on, all the while I am trying to clean my hands, she gently took the bloody cloth, wrapped my hands in bandages and laid me down.

I watched as she unbuttoned her bodice, I could see her shift underneath, I watched her in the dressing table mirror, the 'wedding' gift we had got for ourselves in Jefferson City. I watched as inch after inch of Emma came into my view. She was so delicate, just a hair over five feet, thin as a rail, her bust held in by that fool corset she made for herself, I the bigger fool for buying her the bits in Saint Louis on one of my Begging Trips.

When she was down to her drawers and the corset over her chemise, she turned to me for help with her hair. I sat up and tried to fiddle with the ribbons and bows she would use, another of my fool gifts to her. The light blue always made her eyes shine so. The long blonde tresses fell down to her waist now.

Such a difference we were: me a lumbering ox of a woman: her a delicate flower: me with my ugly brown hair, lifeless and straight; hers blonde and shining like dawn on the meadow; my big floppy teats looking like a couple bags got dropped from a height; her breasts were perfect and round, full of youth and the joy of a touch, crowned by peaks of pink and red which made my mouth water - as well as other things.

I forgot my own pain as I helped her from the rest of those blasted rags. Soon she was laughing and giggling as I near threw her on our bed, and climbed my naked self above her. It had been Jacob's and my bed, but now it was ours, I missed him so and would have had him with me now, but he was gone and this little woman and I saved each other for misery and loneliness. I think Jacob would have been happy for me. I was certain he would have been happy to enjoy Emma with me.

She kissed me hard with passion and a need that no preacher would have thought proper, but then they can go hang since they would have condemned us anyway. I felt her fingers pull my hair as I worked my way down that sweet little body, clean and clear of mark or brand she was as perfect a woman as any man or woman could want.

Her lips were sweet like honey, her breath like the air after a spring rain, clean and fresh. Her smile shown all the way from her mouth to her eyes, and I kissed her, she kissed me and our tongues met and fenced in a very impure way. I attacked her neck and she laughed so loud my ears hurt, as I nibbled and licked from nape to ear sometimes I would even threaten to suck on her nose! I never did of course, but I enjoyed her attempt to protect her proboscis, her arms flailing always sent her beautiful teats bouncing.

I sucked her small nipples until I thought she would scream, they were always hard for me, I suppose I should be ashamed but I was beyond shame now. I sucked and nibbled, tweaked and licked from on then the other till finally she put her hands on my shoulders and pushed me down. I knew of course what she wanted, the room reeked of her sex and I was not going to deny her long, but only a little.

I kissed and nibbled my way down her ribs kissing and gently tickling as I went. Finally, I was at her belly just above her mound. I kissed, sucked and nibbled her muscled tummy, it was growing late but I was in no hurry.

"Martha will you please! I have work in the morning and it is almost midnight! I need to release and get some sleep."

Her playful tone belied the state of her need, her sex was soaking, and she was in dire straits.

I relented and threw her legs over my shoulders, reaching around her thighs to hold her down by grabbing hold of her mounds and workin' them to a fair the well. She loved that. Her husband had been the gentle sort, as had my Jacob, but we women, we know when we want a good going over, and tonight Emma did.

I dove down into her quim and nibbled, sucked and licked it till it was glistening in the moonlight from our combined juices. I planned to get all I could, her tissues down below belied her size, where her body was tiny, almost like a gnome, her pussy was made to take the largest of men. Lips that protruded from her mound to give welcome to those who would enter, a mound full and plump, enough for a woman twice her size, made it clear what her sex was and its purpose. A thick forest of curly blond hair covered her mound. It traveled up to her belly button and across to both thighs, a prodigious forest that I had to surmount to find my goal.

As I nibbled and sucked and prepared to tongue the canyon of fragrant lust, I felt her hands again, demanding attention to her sex. Being a decent lover, I chose to ignore, and I proceeded to lick and bite, taste and tease all about her innermost parts. She bucked and begged then threatened my death in a dozen horrible ends if I did not finish what I had started.

I would have prolonged our play but I was tired myself, I licked her center, sucked it dry of juices I loved and commenced my attack on her proper. Her nub was at attention, demanding its just desserts as I nibbled and cajoled it till I finally latched on as a starving babe when I knew she was near her peak.

Poor Emma was powerless to stop my assault and I doubted she wanted to, thighs now clamped securely about my head, legs locked behind my back driving me forward and deeper as her hands nearly shoved me up into the place babies should have emerged.

"Dear Lord, Martha please!"

Her appeals sounded of anguish now, and I did not have the heart to refuse her any longer, so as her voice broke, I drove deep into her one last time with my tongue and worked her nub with my nose, then broke free of the well of fine wine and latched onto her core, sucking as deeply as I could into my mouth while gently nibbling and stroking it with my tongue. I was rewarded.

Emma arched her back so high she touched the bed only at her heels and shoulders. All between was clear of the bed, she screamed and drove herself into me while pushing me into her, a rain of gasps, screams words and curses fell upon me, some were words I did not know she had ever heard, but it seemed she knew them very well in the throes of her passion, and although in the brilliant light of day, she could not recall their meaning she used them very well now in the dark of night.

Exhausted she fell asleep, I cuddled her, held her close covering us with our wedding quilt.

In the morning I could still see the blood on my hands, but I did not tell Emma. In the morning, Emma was the same, I was different. I knew that right away, but we did not talk about it, not at first.

I sent the boy's Ma a letter, told her how sorry I was for his passing, that we did what we could. I could not bring myself to tell her how he died. I lied and said he was valiant, what was the harm in a little lie to ease her pain? She had somebody write back, it was clearly a man's hand. She was thankful; he was her only son. I cried for days over his grave.

There had been others since. It was easier each time. They were not so innocent; some were downright wicked. The last was a man who snuck into the house, tried to attack Emma, and I came in from the field, he had her half naked, a knife to her throat, demanded I give him money, a horse or he would kill us both. I drew and shot him through the throat, he nicked Emma on the cheek as he fell, scared her a little. For that I put my foot on his chest as he begged and shot him through the eye. I did not feel bad for him, killing was getting easier.

I glanced down at my hands, even through the genteel gloves I could see the boy's blood, as well as the blood of others. Pain drew my thoughts back to the present. Trains, 'tarnation, why'd they not make seats for sitting on for long periods?

My rump was hurting bad, so I rose with some relief to find a seat away from the stares. The train was getting ready to go, I thought I'd best collect my thoughts and bag, and find a better seat.

'How do women wear these things?' I asked myself. I hated dresses, completely ridiculous, which was funny given I had spent most of my life in them. I moved forward, trying to get the blood to work its way back into my legs, my bottom was a lost cause. Emma said it was too much muscle, I must have pouted as she kissed it anyway. I never in my life would have hoped that anyone besides Jacob would have liked it, especially a woman, but it was going on ten years since that girl had come into my life. I could feel my smile return. I could not keep it off my face when I thought of her.

I tried to focus on the other passengers keep'n my mind off of the pain my well-muscled, but ample bottom was screaming at me about, or the consequences of thinking about Emma kissing the pain away which would become very evident if I did not distract myself.

I really had no qualms sharing the railroad car with anyone, for a change the coach was not jam packed. Whether it was the weather, the money turmoil's I have heard about or whatever, I was grateful. I should, I thought, be able to find another seat, and if I stopped chuntering to myself I might even settle down.

I glanced around me as I moved forward. There was a family of coloreds in the back near the caboose, who held tight to their few possessions. I hoped their future was better than whatever past they were leaving behind.

Jacob had hated slavery; I hate it worse now since it cost me him. I hoped for his sake, that they find a better life. Maybe it would make his loss worth something, even though he was on the wrong side, even by his own account. But as he said, a man has to do his duty by his country, and he went with Robert E Lee to fight - and to die - for it.

There was the normal complement of traveling salesman, gamblers, and general no accounts, but what really got my attention was a couple of true oddballs up near the front, so I decided to plant myself next to them. One was tall comely redheaded woman and the other looked like a little waif lying with her head in the redhead's lap. Not a position I would have put up with from my pupils unless they were true young'uns or dyin'. I suspected the redhead of being an Irish girl and the young one of being her charge; but I also had other suspicions.

Their clothes spoke two things, tenderfoot and money. The clothing was clearly store bought, not just store bought cloth but all store bought, and they had the look of brand new. Never having been patched or mended. I looked down at my best traveling skirt, and although Emma was magical with the needle, I could see where it had been repaired more than once because of a stray nail or sliver of wood had done it harm. It was certainly nothing that would be seen in Saint Louis. They were clearly dressing not to attract attention, but if you knew what to look for, you could see the signs. Anyhow, that corsetry the redhead was wearing was none too secure by the looks of it. Wasn't my fault, you could hardly avoid seeing 'em. Nice ones too. Liked them. Concentrate Martha!

I introduced myself, and the Irish girl told me her name was Kate. The young'un was a perky little thing and spoke with an English accent. I suspected she'd been educated there, like my Jacob.

As I doubted they'd know Marion, I told 'em I was going to St Charles, reckoning they'd have heard of that.

"We're going to Kansas," the cute little one said.

"Well isn't that nice?" I smiled. "But we ain't in Kansas now, so let's relax and get to know each other."