Unmentionable
The last entry was about kind deeds done by Frank, Arb's younger brother, and his family and associates. This one concerns Frank's wife, Annie Laura Mangum Lambson, and an incident from her childhood. It is in first person.
"One winter my father left his family to work in Silver City. We were living in Alpine at the time. How I remember that winter; I was about four years old, and the snow was so deep. Our good old shepherd dog killed a deer that had floundered in a snow drift...some would say that was cruel, but nevertheless, we had fresh meat, and we were in need of food. In those days all of the pioneers were hungry some of the time, some of them all of the time! The following year we farmed that place up next to the hill at the far west end of the valley.
Our best cow had a nice, white heifer calf. I remember that one particular man of Luna wanted to buy it. Mother refused to part with it. One day she saddled her horse and went to Luna leaving my brother Kay and me at home. Mother gave us last minute instructions for our protection as she always did: 'Remember, you must not go into the house, and if you see anyone coming, hide in the weeds and bushes.' So, in order to be near the high weeds, we played in the dry creek bed, generally out of sight. It was unusual to have white visitors, and when we heard the sound of tramping hooves, we crawled into the weeds and lay very still for a long time. We heard the sound come, stop, and begin to go again, and I was curious. I raised my head and gasped to see a man, whom we knew very well, driving mother's calf ahead of him. Being young and carefree, we forgot the incident until time to milk the cows that night. Tom went to bring the calves in, and when he came back he told mother he couldn't find the white calf. Then I remembered. My mother had a hard time believing me, thinking that since I was very imaginative, I was making up a story. Two days went by and no white calf; mother was highly perplexed!
She must have begun to wonder if my story was true, because she saddled up and again made the ride to Luna, with the same instructions for us. She went to the home of the man in question, the very one who had wanted to buy the calf! At the house she was treated cordially and invited inside. She asked if anyone had seen her white calf, and the answer was an emphatic, 'No!'. When she left, mother was even more bewildered. She told them she was going to ride by the store and then on home, but she managed to slip around to the back of their barn and peek in. There was her white calf! She unlatched the door, and she and the calf high-tailed it home. The calf was never mentioned again by either family."
Our Lambson Family, pp 95-96
A slice of life from the wild southwest😄.
