Chapter Thirty-One

Robert didn’t know what to do except keep sending Sophie to school, but he made a point of telling her that she was to notify him immediately if Ms. Garduño made her write ‘I will not lie’ again. There wasn’t much he could do about little girls, but he had no problem setting a grown woman straight.

Without telling Sophie, he wrote to Amalia for advice. And to see if they could still give her a spot at their school. He hated the thought of sending her so far away, and of course Sophie would have to want it, too. But giving her a valid option would at least reassure her that he was trying to find a solution.

He knew he would be waiting a while for an answer from Amalia, which would be complicated by the fact that there was only one messenger leaving town each week, and he had to travel several days by donkey to get to the nearest town with a post office. The USS postal service was itself an uncertain and rickety thing, patched together using the remnants of old United States post offices and uncertain roads and railways. Robert would be surprised if he had a response within a month.

And so he settled back into his routine of lodge repairs and store improvements, making a point this time of devoting a little time to Sophie in the evenings and joining her for horseback rides on Saturday afternoons when the weather permitted. Already the days were growing cooler and he wondered how he would keep his daughter occupied when the snow drifts kept her inside. He also wondered how he would clothe her.

Norma had a solution to the latter problem. Each fall, spring and summer she received mail order catalogs from some of the shops in Santa Fe and Albuquerque. Sometimes when business was slow, she and Fernanda the cashier would flip through the books, dog-earing the pages with coats, dresses or household goods that they particularly liked, knowing all the while that they would be lucky to scrape together enough USS dollars to pay for even the sale items.

One rainy day when the store was empty, Robert asked Norma if he could look through her catalogs. “Sophie needs some winter clothes. We traveled light when we came from Kentucky, and children grow so fast that bringing last winter's clothes with us wouldn't have made much sense anyway.”

Norma was only too eager to help, and soon Fernanda joined them, pointing at pictures of girls’ coats and winter stockings, and cooing over knit caps with tassels. “Shopping for children is so much fun,” Norma said.

“I miss it,” Fernanda agreed. “When mine got old enough to have their own opinions, all the pleasure went out of it.”

Robert knew that Sophie would have her own opinions too, but he figured he could make it easy on her by finding some things he thought she would like and letting her make the final decisions from there.
Later that afternoon, after Sophie and Mateo had arrived, dripping in spite of having huddled together under an oiled sheet as they rode through the rain on Baltazar, Robert took her aside to look at his selections. “You’ll need a coat, gloves, a hat, some wool socks, a sweater or two, and some heavier pants. I bookmarked some things I thought you would like. Take a look and let me know.”

Before settling in with the catalogs, Sophie grabbed a Coca-Cola and gave one to Mateo as well. The corners of Norma’s mouth turned down at this, but Sophie lifted her chin, daring her to say anything. Norma shrugged and walked away.

The two children huddled over the books, flipping through the pages and debating the merits of down versus wool coats, and patterned versus plain sweaters. Since Sophie’s favored styles were frankly unisexual, Mateo felt no awkwardness at helping her shop. When they had finally decided on Sophie’s winter wardrobe and held out their tongues to catch the last drops of Coke they could coax out of the glass bottles, Mateo sat back and sighed. “You sure are lucky to have a dad that’s rich.”

Sophie disagreed. “He’s not rich. People just think that because he has a store.”

“No, they say his dad sold their house up on the mountain for a lot of money at the start of the Resource Wars. He used the money to buy gold, and it’s still hidden somewhere.”

“That sounds like a fairy story.” Sophie giggled. “Maybe leprechauns guard the gold and we can go looking for it next time there’s a rainbow.”

Mateo frowned. “I’m serious. “It’s a known fact that they used to have a big house, and they sold it for a lot of money.”

“Well, yes. That part is true,” Sophie admitted. “I’ve seen the house. Dad says he and his brother used to go up there to play after the new owners had to abandon it. But that doesn’t mean there’s a chest full of gold hidden somewhere, like pirate treasure. I’m sure whatever they got for the house, they used it up trying to keep the lodge open and buying things for the store. We have to buy food for the whole town, you know, and we never know when someone will buy something and pay us back for it, or if they’ll come and buy it at all.” She decided to try on Mateo the phrase that her father had liked so much. “We’re store-rich but cash-poor.”

“Oh yeah?” Mateo’s eyes met hers in challenge. “If you’re cash-poor, then how does your father plan to pay for all those new clothes? Plus, he’ll need new winter clothes for himself, won’t he?”

He made a good point, and Sophie hesitated before answering. “I’m sure he keeps a little money for emergencies and things like that,” she finally said. “Doesn’t everybody?”

“Not my parents. If there’s a dollar in my house right now, you can be sure my dad owes somebody two.”

“Well…that still doesn’t make me rich.”

Mateo was about to say something, but at that moment Norma came around the corner. “There you are,” she said to Mateo. “We’ve got the order ready for the Eichmanns, and it’s stopped raining.”

The boy jumped to his feet. “Yes, Mama Norma.” He gave a little wave to Sophie and flashed his contagious smile. “You’re still my best friend, even if you are a rich girl.”

After he had gone, Norma asked what that remark had been about. Sophie merely shrugged. “You know how poor people are.” She had already figured out that Norma thought herself better than families like Mateo’s. “They think everyone who has two shoelaces and a clean toothbrush is rich.” Then she hopped off her chair and went to find her father.