Chapter Text
May 8th 1902
The weather was certainly warming up in Fentress, Texas, but it hadn’t yet reached the blistering heights of its usual summer heat. This was ultimately a relief to Calpurnia Tate as she found it much easier to assist Dr. Pritzker at his veterinary office when it wasn’t over a hundred degrees outside. Of course Callie still had the secret advantage of sneaking off to the river for her daily swim during such times, but she couldn’t exactly do that and help him at the office. Her parents—especially Mother—wouldn’t have approved, but one of the only good things about having six(!) brothers was that she could often escape their scrutiny.
At that moment none of that mattered though as school was still in session and it was only lunch. Most of the time, the boys and girls were scattered apart from one another while they ate, but Callie’s younger brother Travis had ended up eating lunch with Callie and her best friend Lula more than a few times. This was one of those times. Travis was in the middle of telling Lula about the latest news about his coydog and Callie was only halfway paying attention. Lula at least seemed interested and as Travis still harbored a crush on her, that seemed to be all the encouragement he needed to keep talking to her.
Callie meanwhile was busy thinking about the latest Science unit that she and Granddaddy were working on. Ever since she had told him about working at Dr. Pritzker's to hopefully earn a proper education, they were studying women scientists. Last month they had talked about Marie Curie (who had discovered an element and earned not one but two college degrees) and now they were focusing on Isabella Bird—the naturalist and photographer. It was always comforting to know that contrary to the beliefs of many in Fentress, she was not the only girl out there interested in Science. She sometimes felt a bit sorry for her other classmates though. Maybe if they had somebody like Granddaddy who was full of knowledge and curiosity about the world, they’d look at Nature differently too. As it was, she was the only one. She was well aware that some of them found her and Granddaddy to be rather odd (to put it politely), but she couldn’t care less. At the end of the day, they were the ones missing out.
She was thinking about some of the photos she’d seen from Miss Bird when she felt someone nudge her from the side. Callie shook herself out of her thoughts and saw that Lula had been the one to get her attention. “Oh, sorry, what were you saying Lula?” She asked.
“I wanted to know if you wanted to play some duets later this week,” Lula asked. “Travis said your mother got you some new sheet music last week.”
This was true. Against her better wishes, piano lessons were a daily part of her life and Mother had been trying to get her to start playing more difficult pieces. It wasn’t as if Callie hated piano playing—it was more bearable than cooking or sewing at least—but she far preferred to be outside or reading. Still, Mother insisted that such a skill was necessary for a “proper young lady” and as such she was stuck with lessons until she turned eighteen. A whole four years away. However, Lula was her best friend and although she knew better than to invite her over to work on a Domestic Arts assignment, piano was a generally safer way to go.
“Okay,” Callie said slowly. She still needed to make time for her lessons with Granddaddy and working at Dr. Pritzker’s, but she was sure she could squeeze in some time for playing duets too. “Maybe you could come over after school tomorrow.”
“That would be nice Callie,” Lula said. What Callie did not realize though was that a certain younger brother may end up being a hurdle—although not in a way that any of them would expect.
It was getting closer to the end of the school day and most of the students were preparing to walk home with their siblings or their friends.
Callie usually walked home with Lula and sometimes Travis (her other brothers usually walked ahead or behind) and was about to go meet Lula, when she heard Travis ask, “Hey where did you find that fox den again?”
She turned to see that he was talking to one of their classmates—Woodrow Chadwick—several feet from where she was standing. “Uh…I think I saw it in the woods by the post office,” She heard him reply. “Why?”
Okay she needed to nip this in the bud fast. Travis may have been one of the nicest boys she knew and a huge animal lover, but he also didn’t really understand them very well. The lack of understanding came from the fact that despite being now thirteen, Travis was convinced that all animals were meant to be his friends. It wasn’t that Callie wanted him to be cruel to animals, but this had led to him having a series of…unusual pets. He’d once adopted not one but two skunks much to the consternation of many (Callie included) and brought them to school with disastrous results. She thought these "adoptions" had stopped after the successful integration of Scruffy into their family, but she had probably underestimated him.
She quickly walked over the two of them, before Travis had a chance to say anything and said, “Travis, we need to get going. Lula’s waiting.” She nodded slightly at Woodrow in recognition and he gave her an even briefer nod in return. The two of them weren’t exactly best friends. She’d once socked him for insulting Granddaddy and he’d once tried to cheat Travis out of a contest at the Fentress Fair. The latter had led to him getting shunned by the other students for a while. Even her older brother Lamar, who was often a world class pill himself hadn't found it amusing. It turned out that being completely unpleasant to most of your classmates and trying to dupe one of the nicest students at school made people not want to spend time with you. Who would have thought?
Admittedly though that whole experience seemed to have given him a strong wake-up call. He wasn’t her favorite person—he was still good friends with Lamar after all—but he wasn’t needlessly antagonizing people for the fun of it anymore. “Oh right,” Travis said and he quickly picked up his satchel from the ground. “Thanks for telling me about the den, Woodrow!” He added before hurrying off to meet Lula.
Callie was about to follow him, when Woodrow asked, “Does he want to start hunting foxes or something?”
The idea of Travis hunting any animal was laughable, but most people still weren’t aware of just how much he wanted to domesticate every animal he could get his hands on. “Or something,” Callie replied wryly. Now I have to make sure he doesn’t do anything stupid. Such as adopting yet another wild animal.
Before he could say anything, she heard one of their other classmates call out Woodrow’s name and they both turned to see some of the boys—including her older brothers Sam Houston and Lamar—across the yard. Callie figured they were probably going over to one of their houses to play a game of baseball. Well as long as it wasn’t at her house, Callie didn’t see a problem with it. The two went their separate ways and Callie hurried off to meet Lula and Travis.
“Sorry about the wait,” Callie said. “Woodrow had to ask me a question.”
“It’s alright,” Lula said politely. “So what kind of duets would you want to play tomorrow?” She asked as they started walking.
Callie answered her, but couldn’t help but notice that Travis looked rather distracted at the moment. Yup she was definitely going to have to keep a closer eye on him for the rest of the day.
Callie had every intention of monitoring her younger brother, but as soon as Mother saw her walk inside, she called out, “Calpurnia! Let’s do your piano practice now.”
“But I just got home,” Callie began to protest, before the stern look on Mother’s face made her fall silent. She supposed that this was because she had missed two of her piano practices last week. The only consolation about doing this right after school was that practice was only a half hour.
She sat on the piano bench and struggled through a piece by Chopin while Mother worked on mending a basket of her brother’s shirts. Her piano playing was technically correct, but it lacked that lyrical quality that came from someone who genuinely enjoyed such activities. Plus she could swear that she felt Mother wince when she hit a sour note once or twice. Callie kept a watchful eye on the mantle clock the entire time and sprang from the bench the second it hit the half hour mark.
Mother didn’t say anything, but Callie suspected that she was equally relieved for the piano practice to be over. “Oh Mother,” Callie began, “Lula’s coming over tomorrow after school. She wanted to play some piano duets.”
“Certainly,” Mother said. Before she could say anything else, Callie made her excuses and left the parlor. She was still intending on finding Travis, but she saw Granddaddy head into the library and she made the split second decision to follow him instead. Besides, I’ll just be in there for a little bit.
Five minutes later she was pooling over some of Miss Bird’s photographs while Granddaddy was reading a book called Experimental Determination of the Velocity of Light.
“All of these pictures are so amazing,” Callie marveled as she looked at the different landscape pictures Miss Bird had taken of Japan and China. “And she grew up in England right?”
Her grandfather nodded. “She started traveling in 1854,” He explained. “Her doctor told her a sea voyage would do her good.”
“I’d love to go on a sea voyage,” Callie admitted. Or rather she’d love to see the sea in general. She thought longingly of the thought of gentle waves lapping the shore, and the sand beneath one’s feet. Then there was the thought of seeing one of the sea animals like a dolphin or a whale. Sea animals. Animals. Travis!
“Uh Granddaddy, I’m afraid I have to go now. I can’t say too much but I may have to deal with an…animal issue of my own,” Callie said.
“Very well then,” Granddaddy said mildly. He didn’t seem too concerned with what could be going on which was honestly a testament to him.
She quickly kissed him on his whiskery cheek and then hurried out of the library. Now where to find Travis? Well the barn is usually where he likes to go when he gets any funny ideas about animals. But I don’t know for sure. Maybe one of the other boys has seen him?
She decided to check upstairs first. Travis shared a room with Sul Ross and Jim Bowie, so she went ahead and knocked on their door. Nobody answered and a quick peek inside told her that none of her younger brothers were there anyway. She went back downstairs and headed out to the barn. The barn was home to the horses, the milk cow, the barn cats, and Travis’s rabbits. Callie knew that if had found a fox cub, he would be in the far end of the barn.
Sure enough she caught sight of her brother knelt down there and she said, “Travis—what are you doing?”
Her brother turned around and much to her dismay she saw that he was cradling a small gray fox cub in his arms. The fox cub was probably only a few weeks at most—it certainly wasn’t a full-grown fox yet—and his eyes were open. “Isn’t he cute?” He said cheerfully, clearly missing (or ignoring) the look on Callie’s face. “I think I’ll call him Jack Fox.”
“Travis Tate,” Callie exclaimed as she walked closer to him and “Jack Fox”. “What on earth are you doing with that fox cub?! I thought the whole point of you getting Scruffy was that you would stop trying to adopt every animal you see.” She also wanted to protest over him naming yet another wild animal, but that was par for the course with him.
“I know. I know,” Travis said. “But when I heard Woodrow talking about the fox den he saw, I really just wanted to check it out. And then I saw Jack Fox outside the den and I couldn’t see the mother and he looked so weak and lonely. You wouldn’t have left him alone either, Callie.” He rearranged his arms slightly, so that Callie could better see the cub. “Plus isn’t he cute?”
Admittedly he was rather adorable, but Callie fought to maintain a straight face. “Look, he can’t stay in the barn forever. And I am not going to help you take care of the cub either okay?”
The next thing she knew, Callie found herself looking for a wooden box in the barn for Travis to put the fox cub inside. The two siblings and Jack Fox were near the dark end of the barn as Callie figured that would be the best place to create a “fox den”. “How do you always manage to drag me into this stuff?” She grumbled.
“Come on Callie Vee. You won’t regret it,” Travis said as soon as Callie located an empty box—that thankfully had some holes already in it which would make it easier for breathing purposes. “I promise it’ll just be for a little while.”
“Can I get that in writing?” She muttered but her brother was now too busy putting Jack Fox in his new “den”.
Well knowing Travis, this whole ordeal certainly would not be a boring one. And for better or worse, Callie knew that she was now part of it.