Work Text:
Good Help Is Hard To Find
“Alright,” Slim said, smoothing out a sheet of paper on the dining table. “I stopped by the print shop before I left town today. For a dime, we get a maximum of twenty-five words. The way I figure it, if we use ‘em right, that should surely be enough, don’t you think?” Slim asked.
“Sure. Only need three, really,” Jess called back from the kitchen, setting the last of the supper dishes back on their shelf. “House Keeper Needed.”
“Housekeeper is one word, I’m pretty sure,” Slim said, whittling at a pencil with his pocketknife. He brushed the shavings onto the floor.
Jess carried his coffee into the living room and took the chair across from Slim. “Even better,” he shrugged, “Housekeeper Needed, two words instead of three.”
Slim wasn’t convinced. He spun the pencil around in his hand and chewed the inside of his lip. “Shouldn’t we at least mention Mike? So they know what they’re in for?”
Jess glanced over Slim’s shoulder. Mike was lying on the floor in front of the fireplace, happily sorting through an old jar of buttons. Seeing him now, you’d think he was a perfect angel. Bath time… That was another story. He wasn’t sure if twenty-five words would be enough to really let a woman know what she was in for.
“Maybe mention the good stuff,” Jess conceded. “Something like… Caring for generally well behaved child, maybe?”
“Let’s leave out the “generally”,” Slim said, “so we don’t scare anyone off. Is well behaved one word or two?”
“You’re the one with the fancy education,” Jess scoffed, sipping his coffee.
Slim just rolled his eyes. He didn’t think primary school and a little homeschooling from his mother counted as “fancy”, but it was true he’d had more than Jess.
“Oh well. I’ll put one of those little dash marks between ‘em and Mr. Wilson can fix it when he goes to set the type,” he decided. “So we better keep to twenty-four words, in case it ends up bein’ two.”
Jess watched as Slim wrote “Housekeeper needed, care for well-behaved child” on the paper.
“You can add that he’s healthy, too,” Jess suggested. “Caring for a healthy kid has gotta be simpler than caring for a poorly one.”
Slim dutifully crossed out his first line and re-wrote it, adding “healthy” in the middle.
They both sat back and looked at the paper, considering their work.
Slim leaned forward, crossed out “child”, and replaced it with “boy” before sheepishly glancing up at Jess. “Figured we should be honest about that detail,” he said. Jess reluctantly nodded his agreement.
“Should we specifically say women only?” Jess asked, head tilted while he tried to read upside down. “We got plenty ‘a words left, and Mort said a man wouldn’t do.”
“Good idea,” Slim agreed. He started to expand his line but soon just crossed it out completely and started over. He read aloud as he wrote.
“Women… needed… for… housework…”
“Light housework,” Jess interjected. Slim scribbled a bit and went on.
“For light housework… and care… of a healthy… well-behaved… boy,” Slim finished.
Jess pursed his lips. “Ads for ranch hands usually mention the pay at the end. And the place.”
“Right,” Slim said. He smiled. “Haven’t written one of these since you’ve been around,” he mentioned, adding a few more words. “Say, how much do people pay women these days, anyhow?”
“Now how am I supposed to know a thing like that?” Jess asked, incredulous.
“Well, I, uh, just figured you might,” Slim said, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck. “You’ve been friends with a few more… women with jobs, I reckon, than I have,” he finished awkwardly.
Jess let a slow grin take over his face. “Mr. Sherman, if you’re jealous…”
“I’m not jealous!” Slim interrupted, tossing a quick glance over at Mike, still focused on his buttons.
Jess’s grin didn’t budge. “It’s that round face you got there, pard. Too honest,” he said sagely. Slim threw his hands up. “It’s easier to make friends when they think there might be… extra earning opportunities,” he said, quirking a dark eyebrow suggestively.
“Forget I asked,” Slim said in exasperation. “We’ll just say “salary” and let ‘em bargain for it.” He crossed out his last line with a little more force than necessary before re-writing it. When he was done, he flipped it around to Jess.
“Women needed for light housework and care of a healthy, well-behaved boy. Room, board, and salary. Apply Sherman Ranch,” Jess read aloud.
Mike chose that moment to abandon his buttons and came around to Jess’s elbow, nudging his way in so he could see. Without looking up from the paper, Jess pulled Mike up onto his knee.
“What do we gotta have a girl around for, anyway,” Mike grumbled.
“It’s “have to”, not gotta,” Slim corrected sternly. “And you know why, Mike. We’ve talked about this.”
“Yeah, Tiger,” Jess said, giving the boy a reassuring squeeze. “Slim and me are just tired of our own cookin’. It’ll be better this way, you’ll see. We just gotta put all the good stuff in this here print ad, so the ladies’ll like you.”
Slim mumbled something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like “have to”, but he didn’t interrupt. Jess just smirked at him over Mike’s head.
Mike, meanwhile, defiantly crossed his arms over his small frame and narrowed his eyes. “Ladies always like me fine,” he said with a disgusted huff. “Always pinchin’ my cheeks and tryn’a kiss me and stuff. Yuck,” he said, making the other two chuckle. “What makes you think they’re gonna like you?”
The laughter stopped short. Jess and Slim stared at each other across the table, eyebrows raised in surprise. They hadn’t considered that angle.
“Hate to say it, pard, but the man’s got a point,” Jess said. He looked down at the paper, his lips moving as he counted up the words. “We got five left. Better write some good stuff in there about us, somethin’ that would make a woman wanna come live out here.”
Slim pulled the paper back toward himself and tapped the pencil against his lips.
Silence fell around the table.
“I’m drawin’ a blank," Slim finally said, letting out a sigh.
“Same here,” Jess replied, running a hand through his curls in frustration. “There’s gotta be something about us, right?” he asked, looking over at Slim.
Slim, however, was looking at Mike, his head tipped to the side in thought.
“What about you, Mike?” he asked. “What makes you want to live here?”
Mike looked back at him with those big, blue eyes, wide and innocent as only a child’s could be.
“You got a big yard, and horses, and chickens, and plenty of frogs in the crick,” he said, thinking it over. He shrugged. “You said you’d take care of me, and you did,” he added, straightforward as always. “I trust you.”
Quiet descended again. Slim swallowed hard and pretended not to notice the way Jess’s jaw twitched.
He cleared his throat. “Well, what kind of men do women trust?”
“Married ones,” Jess quipped.
Slim rolled his eyes. “What kind of men do women not trust?”
“Drunks,” Jess answered, his eyes lighting up. “At least we ain’t drunks. We’re hard working, upstanding local ranchers!” he declared dramatically, waving his free hand around in a clear impression of their local preacher. Mike giggled and even Slim had to laugh. “Make it sound all fancy-like, and that should be good enough, right?”
“How about industrious?” Slim asked. “That fancy enough?”
Jess shrugged. “If it means what I just said, then sure.”
Slim crossed out the most recent line, flipped the paper over, and wrote out their twenty-three words.
“Sober, industrious ranchers need women for light housework and to care for a healthy, well-behaved boy. Room, board, and salary. Apply Sherman Ranch,” he read.
“I like it,” Jess said.
“Me too,” chimed Mike.
Slim looked over at his little family and smiled.
“That settles it, then. We’ll have it run tomorrow.”