Rainy Day Women
My life has been filled with women of one kind or another. They've been here in good times and in bad, in sunshine and in shadow, no matter what was happening day to day. They're what I call my rainy day women, and I wouldn't have gotten this far in life without them. Two of them have been more influential than others . . . my mother, Isabelle Grayson Maverick, who died when I was only five, and my wife, Doralice Donovan Maverick, who's kept me alive for more than half of the years I've spent on this earth and given me all these beautiful children. My life wouldn't have gotten started, and I wouldn't still be here now, if it weren't for those two.
I must have been about two years old when I first realized how spectacularly beautiful my mother was. And I'm not just referring to what she looked like on the outside; that was a pretty enough package as it was. No, Isabelle Grayson Maverick had the most loving heart and the kindest eyes I've ever seen on anyone. No matter what she was doing, if I put up my little hands for momma to pick me up, everything stopped until she'd satisfied my need for her warmth and love. When I realized she couldn't always stop what she was doing, the knowledge that she was there was what sustained my faith in her love.
Momma taught me to read using the Bible that Pappy gave her on their wedding day. Bret had just started school and I was still too young to go, but I wasn't gonna be happy until I could read, just like him. So me and momma made a deal . . . she'd teach me to read if I'd go to church with her on Sundays. I think I got the better of that bargain, because momma didn't know, but I loved goin' to church with her. Bret stayed home with Pappy most Sundays, but I'd get all dressed up and hold momma's hand while she drove the buggy. And the gospel singing that the choir did! I was so excited the first time the reverend read the twenty-third Psalm, and I could read it right along with him. She turned me into a lifelong reader, with love of the Bible and Charles Dickens.
She passed along her love of animals to me. I helped her take care of the chickens, and learned how to milk Sadie the cow, and we could identify most of the birds around our house. Of course we didn't know the proper names for them, so we made up our own. Springtime was the best when all the animals were born, and we could sit out behind the house and watch the baby rabbits scamper around. She was a friend to everyone and visited all the ladies of the church; I always went with her. That's how we ultimately lost her. We both caught what momma thought was just a cold from either Mrs. Gurley or Mrs. Harris late one week; for once I was the lucky one; mine eventually went away. Momma's turned into valley fever, and by the end of the summer, she was gone.
Nothing was ever the same after that. There were no loving arms, no dancing brown eyes, no one to sing to me and tuck me into bed at night. Pappy did his best, but he wasn't momma, and I miss her to this day. Her passing left a hole in my life that I sought to fill with other women; women that have played a big part in my day to day existence.
Then there was Doralice – Doralice Donovan Medina, daughter of Maude and Luther Donovan, married at one time to Sergio Medina, son of one of the wealthiest families in Mexico. Until the day he beat her, then tried to rape and strangle her. That's the day she shot him, and the Medina's did everything in their power to have her hanged for murder.
I masqueraded as a Texas Ranger and literally stole her away from the Federales, who were in the process of taking her to Monterrey to be executed. We ran for our lives and were headed home when they caught up with us. I sent her west while I took off for the north, hoping they would give chase to me and not follow the escaped prisoner. I got my wish, along with a bullet from one of their rifles, and outran them until I collapsed. Doralice found me and nursed me through no food or water and a raging infection, giving my Brother Bret and Cousin Beau time to track us down and smuggle us back into Texas.
That was the beginning of the feelings I developed for the beautiful blonde, although I denied my attraction to her for years. I'm not sure exactly why, but I suspect it was the striking similarities between her and the first woman I fell in love with, Carolyn Crawford. Also the first woman I married, although not by choice.
Bret and me knew a southern belle con woman named Samantha Crawford. Bret met her first, when she swindled him out of fifteen-thousand dollars by using an obscure rule from the Book of Hoyle. I heard all about it for months afterward. Then it was my turn, and I had my own run-in with Samantha. I chased her halfway across the country only to end up losing to her. The next time I saw Samantha I thought we were on even footing, but I was wrong, and it took every ounce of cunning that Samantha had to get me out of a potentially fatal mess. That's how I ended up married to her cousin, Caroline Crawford. I promised Samantha I would do her any favor she asked for, if she would just save my hide. And she did.
And then informed me that I was getting married. To her cousin.
I did marry Caroline, and I would have stayed married to her except for one thing – Lon Tenley. He was in cahoots with Caroline's lawyer, Thurgood Shafer, to take over the Double C Ranch, and I had just thrown a monkey wrench into the works. Two things had become crystal clear over a few short hours – I'd fallen in love with Caroline, and Shafer and Tenley would do anything to get their hands on the ranch . . . including murder. Caroline and me had decided we were gonna fight them, but Tenley staged an invasion of the house and shot and killed Caroline before I could prevent it. I killed him in retaliation, but it did no good. Caroline was gone, and it was my fault.
We buried Caroline, and I fled to Mexico, where I spent the next few weeks in a drunken stupor, living on Mescal and cheating at poker. I was unable to win any other way, and to this day I have no idea how much that had to do with my state of constant inebriation. I couldn't face life any other way after losing Caroline, and I stayed that way until the night I put a pistol in my mouth and tried to blow my head off. The gun misfired, and God sent me a guardian angel named Melodia Montoya. The pretty Señorita was nothing but a friend, but she took care of me and nursed me back to health when I wasn't capable of taking care of myself. She got me through the darkest hours of my life, and eventually I tried to repay the favor by paying for and building the town of Magdalena a new school. Melodia was a teacher but had no school to teach in. In the course of helping with the build my right hand and wrist were broken, and it was weeks before I knew if I was ever gonna be able to play poker again.
Eventually I began to exercise the hand and fingers and discovered I was still capable of the game I loved. When the school was finished and the hand was healed it was time for me to leave Mexico and return to Texas. I'd been 'hiding' below the border for six months; my brother wasn't sure if I was alive or dead.
That wasn't the last time he wondered if I was still breathing or not. Doc Holliday and me were in the midst of playing a practical joke on some poor cowboy in Arizona when we got caught in a landslide in the Superstition Mountains. We'd tried convincing the cowboy that I was Doc Holliday, and Doc was Bart Maverick, and to perpetuate the fraud, we'd traded wallets. When the landslide hit Doc suffered a broken left arm; I'd have gladly traded him injuries. I was so bruised and battered I would have died if it hadn't been for Amy Stanhope, who found me and took me back to her father's ranch. Rather, she took Doc Holliday back to her father's ranch, because that's who my wallet identified me as . . . and I believed it. I had amnesia from all the trauma my body had suffered, and for almost a year my brother searched for me when all signs pointed to my being dead.
It took that long for Amy to nurse me back to health, and in the course of that convalescence John Holliday fell in love with Amy Stanhope. When it became painfully obvious Amy's life would be in danger as long as she was with me, I left her and the Stanhope ranch and headed for Tucson just as Bret and the real Doc arrived looking for me. Once they'd located me and convinced me I was really Bart Maverick, I wanted to marry Amy and take her with me. She had no intention of leaving the ranch, and I had no intention of staying. When I finally regained my memory I knew that Amy had saved my life in more ways than one, but I'd made the right decision by leaving Arizona with Doc and Bret. There was still too much restless spirit in me to stay in one place for the rest of my life.
Sometime later I was in Reno visiting my old friend Declan Savoy when I got a telegram telling me my brother had been gunned down in Dodge City. Now 'gunned down' and Bret Maverick don't go together, but the telegram insisted he was dead. I was in shock and headed for Dodge on the next train. I won't keep you in suspense; of course, Bret wasn't dead. But there was a mystery to solve, and a conspiracy to unravel, and in the course of both I went to work for a delightful woman named Sally Bodeen. Big, blonde and buxom, Sally was as enchanting as the day is long. She wasn't mixed up in the goings-on, but she was on the fringes of the group responsible, and it ended up costing my friend her life. To this day whenever I hear Doralice laugh I think of Sally; they both have that deep-throated raucous laugh, and I love to hear it. I'm just sorry that I couldn't prevent Sally's death.
I met Kate Duecet in Louisiana, and she almost got me hanged. And all because she called me Broderick.
Kate had just broken her engagement to Jacques Armand, with good reason, I might add, and taken up with a fellow named Broderick Michaels. And when she ran across me with a soldier chasing her, she passed me off as Michaels. Only she failed to tell me that Michaels had been convicted of sedition.
Of course, Broderick Michaels was no more guilty of sedition than Bart Maverick was. Since no one had ever seen Michaels, they were willing to believe I was him. Or he was me. The only thing that mattered was that Jacques was determined to hang someone, and it looked like that someone was me. And all because Kate kissed me. Oh, I forgot to tell you that part. The soldier that was chasing her? He saw the whole thing.
She was beautiful, well-educated and funny. And one of the best liars I have ever run across. But she did her best to redeem herself and keep me alive, and she managed both of those tasks. I have to admit that in the end she found herself with the right man, and I learned a valuable lesson about kissing strange women.
There've been plenty of other women in my life, not the least of which are my three daughters. There's the twins, Maude Belinda and Isabelle Justine, affectionately known as Maudie and Belle. They look astoundingly alike and have totally different personalities. Maudie had colic when she was a baby and cried almost constantly. The only one that could get her to stop was Uncle Bret . . . as soon as he picked her up, she was dead silent. As Maudie has grown up she has proven herself to be bright, funny and loyal. She loves everything about the ranch, and every single animal on the ranch loves her. I'm pretty crazy about her, too.
Sweet, shy Belle is the gentlest soul I know. She sits back and studies the situation before commenting on anything. Her opinions are well thought out and she seems to have no prejudices against anything. If you want to know where Belle is, look for the nearest book, and she probably has her nose stuck in it. I have no doubt that Belle will go to college and put all of us to shame.
And then there's my little Lily Beth. She was a surprise, to say the least. If someone had told me that this tiny little thing would be our fifth child, I would have laughed at them. She looks like a two-year-old, and she's already four, and she's as quiet as a church mouse. And she goes nowhere in this world without her six-year-old brother Breton, who seems to have appointed himself her personal protector. She looks at everything with wide-eyed wonder (and her mother's aqua eyes) and everything she sees absolutely delights her. Oh yeah, and she thinks all the little chicks are her babies.
There are two animals that belong in this category, even though they're not human, Melody the cat and Blue the blue roan mare. Melody actually found me, when I was staying at the cabin on the Trinity River. My life had become a jumbled mess, and Melody appeared out of nowhere and adopted me. She was a little brown tabby with the loudest and most melodious meow I'd ever heard, and the first time she opened that sweet little whiskered mouth and went 'Brrrrrrruuuppp' I was hooked. Melody rode with me from the river back to Uncle Ben's house when I went home, and lived the rest of her life with us. She was nineteen before we lost her, and she populated the Maverick households with many a tabby kitten.
Blue was a little blue roan that I bought when I was flush with poker winnings, and she became Cantaro's favorite among all the mares we had. It was actually Blue that helped Cantaro start the line that the B Bar M has become famous for, a cross breed between an Arabian stallion and a blue roan mare. She, like Melody, lived with us a long time and produced many a beautiful foal, with a gentle disposition and an inquisitive mind.
So there you have it. Like I said before, there have been many women in my life, but the ones I've discussed here are the ones I've always been able to count on, or have been a significant influence on my life. Even in bad weather, physical or emotional. My rainy day women.
The End