The thing that hurt the most, after the fact that Ted wouldn't be there to hug her tight for many, many nights, was that Ted hadn't even asked if he could go. One of the nicest things about Ted was that in all matters involving their domestic life, he let her be boss. Even before they married, he let her boss, and in fact, even offered formally to let her boss.
'I'm too busy, I've got my deputying,' he said. 'You look after the rest of it.' Ted had kept his word, too. If Doobie wanted to go to church on Sunday, they went; if she didn't, they didn't. If it was a fine day and she felt like wading in the river, Ted went with her, took off his boots, rolled up his pants legs, and waded in the river with her.
Doobie loved it, that she got to be the boss.
During her hard life with her aunt and uncle, she had been more like a slave than a boss. In her marriage, though, Doobie tried very hard to make good decisions about what to cook, or when to clean, or how to doctor Ted when he got an ailment, usually the grippe.
She tried hard, and she had convinced herself that she was doing a good job and that Ted was happy; because she was convinced that she was doing a good job, it hit her all the harder when Ted walked in and announced that he was leaving in an hour. He said it matter-of-factly, as if he were telling her it might rain.
Doobie couldn't grasp it, at first. She thought she must have misheard, or misunderstood, or that she must still be asleep, having the worst dream of her life, instead of the best.
When Doobie had to admit that it was true, that it wasn't a dream or a misunderstanding, she started crying and cried until she ran out of breath. It was a worse shock than her mother's death. When her mother died, she had been young, and her mother had always been sick. There had been so little happiness that it wasn't very different when her mother went. The big difference was that her Aunt Gladys slapped her frequently. Her mother had never slapped her in her entire life.
But it was certain, Doobie knew immediately, that it was going to be a very different life, now that Ted wasn't going to be there to hold her tight, every night.
'Stop patting me on the back!' Doobie said, vehemently, when she started breathing again and could speak. At that point, she still had a little bit of hope that Ted would change his mind. They had a happy marriage, all eight months of it, and Ted probably had no idea that his going away would upset her so. After all, he had no reason to go away and no place to go away to, not until the old lawman showed up.
Doobie had long realized that Ted's way of thinking was different from her own. What she needed to do was let him know how strongly she felt, and make it clear how much she needed him to stay with her. She had been told, by her one good friend, Susanna Slack, that men were a little dumb, in some ways.
Susanna maintained that they didn't understand the first thing about how women felt; mainly, Susanna believed, men didn't even care to try to understand the first thing about how women felt. That had never sounded exactly right to Doobie. Maybe Ted didn't really understand how she felt, but he was willing to let her be the boss of their family life, and that amounted to pretty much the same thing.
Now, though, in her shock and misery, Doobie was forced to consider that Susanna had been right, after all. Ted Plunkert didn't know a thing about how she felt.
'I guess I better go round up some bedding,' Ted said, as her tears were subsiding.
'The Captain's in a hurry to get going.' 'The Captain, who's he?' Doobie said, furious. 'He's just some old man I never heard of. I don't see why you think you have to go with him.' 'Why, it's Captain Call,' Ted Plunkert said, shocked. He knew his wife hadn't had the advantage of much schooling--he himself hadn't had much, either--but he had not supposed her ignorance to be so profound that she would never have heard of Captain Call.
'I never heard of Captain Call, I tell you!' Doobie yelled. 'I never heard of him! He don't live here, why would I have heard of him?' 'Why, it's Captain Call,' Ted Plunkert repeated. 'Everybody's heard of him. He's the most famous Texas Ranger of all time,' Ted said, still shocked. He was a little embarrassed for Doobie. It was almost as bad as if she had told him she had never heard of air, or the moon, or something. He had lived along the border all his life, and along the border, the Captain was about as well known as air, or the moon.
'Well, I ain't heard of him, why do you have to go?' Doobie asked. She was ready to plead and beg, if she had to.
'Doobie, there's no why to it,' Ted explained, patiently. 'The Captain asked me to ride with him. That's it.' 'If he asked you, you could have said no,' Doobie pointed out, in what she thought was a reasonable, even a calm voice. 'He ain't the president. He can't just order you to run off and leave your wife.' 'Doobie, I swear, he's Captain Call,' Ted said again. 'You don't just go around saying no to him.' Doobie was silent. She didn't want to be angry, but she felt herself getting angry--very angry.
'Besides,' Ted added, 'it's a big honor to be asked to ride with him. I expect it's about the biggest honor I've ever had in my life, or ever will have.' 'What if you ain't back when the baby is born?' Doobie asked. 'What if you don't never come back? What if you never even see our little Eddie? If you go off and get killed, little Eddie might never even get to have a daddy.' 'I guess I better round up that bedding,' Ted said, trying to be patient. In fact, he was becoming a little exasperated. His private belief was that Doobie had temporarily lost her mind.
Instead of feeling honored that Captain Woodrow Call, the most famous Texas Ranger of all time, had singled him out from all the men in Laredo and asked him to go up the river with him, all Doobie could do was cry and complain. After all, the great man could have asked Bob Jekyll to go with him. Bob was the sheriff, and had a better claim to such an honor. But Captain Call had walked around Bob Jekyll and had chosen him. It ought to have been the proudest moment of their marriage, and yet, all Doobie could do was bawl like a heifer.
Of course, he loved Doobie. No man could ask for a better little wife. Her biscuits were first-rate, and she could even repair boots, if the holes in the boots weren't too big.
Ted sincerely hoped she would soon get over being out of her mind. She had no business suggesting that he might have turned down Captain Call's offer. Of course he couldn't refuse Woodrow Call, just because Doobie chose to bawl like a heifer for an hour. It was very inconsiderate of her, Ted thought. After all, he did have to gather up his bedding, and could have used some help. He didn't get any help, though. Almost an hour had passed, and he had to rush. One consequence of the rushing was that he forgot his slicker, an oversight that was to cause him much misery, on the trail.
Doobie Plunkert stood at the back door of their little house and watched hopelessly as Ted and the old Captain and the fat little Yankee rode away. She felt her heart breaking; she didn't think she would be able to endure the ache.
If Ted had just once turned in the saddle and waved at her, it would have made the ache a little easier to
