Chapter 3

I went back inside. Janie and Amy both hugged me said thank you for handling the problem.

"Janie, you almost got into trouble there," I said. "He knew you would come outside, and he was going to grab you and make you go with him. You know that don't you?"

She answered, "I didn't think of it, but now that I do, you are probably right."

"If you want to keep the kids and yourself safe, you need to stay away from him, unless someone is with you, or close enough to keep an eye on you," I told her.

She nodded and we went back to our Christmas Eve celebration.

I knew I would be expected at my parent's house for Christmas, so we were opening presents tonight at my house.

I had bought all the children some clothes and some of the "nice" tennis shoes for Christmas.

As they opened them they were very excited. I took pictures, as they tried them on. The jeans that Linda had bought Amy were those fitted type, and assured me that what I thought of Amy's figure was correct. She was put together nicely. Amy was the only one of the children that had taken after Tex's size. She was about 6 feet tall and very shapely. The boys were built more like Janie, average height and build.

I gave Janie a card with two one hundred dollar bills in it. "Janie, I expect you to buy yourself some clothes with that," I told her firmly. I knew she was the type to put the money away for later. That meant to spend it on the kids.

The tears were rolling down her cheeks from behind her glasses. "Mr. Lee", she always called me that, in spite of the times I asked her to call me Bobby, "this is the best Christmas we have ever had."

I hugged her and told her I was glad.

Later on, after we cleaned up the wrapping mess, I got Amy and Tex, Jr. off by themselves. "I'm going to be gone all day tomorrow," I told them quietly. I opened my gun safe and took out a shotgun and a rifle and showed them to the kids. "Do you two know about shooting?" I asked. They both nodded. I showed them the shotgun, my first, a 20 gauge double barrel and a .22 automatic rifle. They both were country kids and had both shot before. I handed the shotgun to Amy and the rifle to Tex, Jr., along with some ammunition for each.

I admonished them, "If trouble comes, don't flash them or threaten. The first time any bad people see them they need to hear them shoot. Just be careful."

Tex, Jr. nodded and Amy said, "We will be."

They both loaded the guns and went to put them away in their bedrooms.

The next morning, I was up and gone early. I spent a very nice day with my folks, and was pleased with the gifts I got; a work Jacket from my mother and a money clip with my initials from Dad. In spite of the fact of the wonderful day, I was glad to be back on the old homestead that night.

Nothing untoward had happened on Christmas day, so I was satisfied.

The next day, the Lopez family came to work with Linda. They all thanked me for the presents, and brought me one from them. It was a beautiful tooled leather wallet. Maria told me everyone worked on it together. I could see that Linda was wearing her new watch. "Do you like it?" I asked her.

"Si, I would never have bought one so nice," she answered.

We started work after that, and Jose, Maria and the boys went on to work for one of their other clients to pick up some late pecans.

The first crop we were planting next year was some green beans. We were getting the 6 acres under the pecans ready for the beans. Pecans were one of the last trees to leaf out, so we could grow and pick the beans before they would be shaded out, and the trees could take advantage of the fertilizer from growing the beans. We just had to be careful not to till too deeply and damage the pecan roots.

Linda, Amy and I worked on building cold frames to start seeds in for transplanting to the fields. Cold frames were like mini greenhouses made from old windows to let light in and keep the cold out. I had planned to start squash, tomatoes and cucumbers in the frames. Our other crops would start fine from seeds.

A close inspection of the old pastures revealed that there were about forty acres where the grass was in good enough shape to cut for sod. All of the rest would require herbicide treatments to get rid of weeds, or a total replanting. That was not as bad as it sounds. I had a saleable product right now to help offset some upcoming expenses, and I needed to plant some lawn type grasses to allow myself some flexibility in marketing.