Cowboy For Hire

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Cowboy For Hire Page 29

by Duncan, Alice


  “Charlie,” Martin muttered. “Please try to calm down.”

  Tugging at his black coat, the doctor frowned and said, “Really, Mr. Fox, there’s nothing more to be done for Miss Wilkes. With rest, she’ll be just fine. Huxtable, on the other hand, is in pretty bad shape.”

  “Good. I hope the bastard dies.”

  “Charlie!” Karen hissed. “Stop talking like that.”

  “It’s the truth.”

  “I don’t care if it’s the truth or not. For that matter, I’m of a like mind, but we don’t want anybody else to know it.”

  “Oh, dear, oh, dear.” Martin started tugging at his hair.

  “I must say, Mr. Fox, that it’s not your fault Mr. Huxtable remains breathing. You did a good deal of damage to his nose and jaw.”

  The doctor’s words cheered him. “Good.”

  Karen whacked him on the arm, and Charlie, realizing he was being unreasonable, shook himself and muttered, “Sorry, Karen. I’m all right now.”

  “I should hope so.” She poked him in the chest with her rigid forefinger. “Now, I’m going into that tent, and I’m going to tend to Amy. If you want to help, stay out of trouble and don’t hurt anyone else.” And with that, Karen vanished inside the tent.

  Charlie gazed after her, dismayed by her words. Had he caused trouble? He’d thought he was avenging Amy. Maybe in a strange and mysterious world of motion pictures, that was considered trouble. He shook his head to clear it of the cobwebs that seemed to have taken possession of it.

  “I’d appreciate it if you’d stay away from Huxtable, Charlie,” Martin said. “The picture’s wrapped up, and all I have to do now is the editing. The musical score’s been written and the titles are done, and now I’ve got to put it all together. I’m hoping against hope that we won’t have to do any reshoots. I’d as soon not have to worry about one of my stars killing another one, it it’s all the same to you.”

  His voice was gentle, but Martin’s voice was always gentle except when he had to raise it to be heard over the grinding of the cameras. Charlie was suddenly ashamed of himself. “Right,” he said. “I reckon I’ll get going, then, since you don’t need me anymore.”

  Martin’s surprise was evident. “Get going? You mean leave the lot?”

  “Yeah, I reckon.”

  “But don’t you want to wait and make sure Amy’s all right?”

  “I trust the doctor.” He wouldn’t trust that doctor any farther than he could throw him, but he didn’t suppose it mattered. He wasn’t needed here, and he wasn’t wanted here, and he experienced a tremendous need to be gone.

  “But—but, Charlie, how can I get in touch with you.”

  Charlie shrugged. “Darned if I know. Why don’t I call you or something. I can probably find a telephone somewhere.”

  “Do you know where you’ll go? Are you heading back to your brother’s ranch?”

  “No.” By God, he was never going to punch ostriches again. It was long past time he set up for himself. Hell, if he’d had the gumption to get himself organized before now, he wouldn’t have lost the girl he loved.

  Dammit, he wished he’d stop thinking things like that. Obviously, Amy didn’t care enough about him to take him as he was; ergo, he shouldn’t mourn losing her. He mourned anyway. “I’ll be in touch,” he muttered, and began walking slowly in the direction of his tent.

  “Please do, Charlie,” Martin called after him. “Don’t forget, I’m taking everybody in the picture to Chicago for the grand premiere. And you’ve agreed to do one more Peerless picture. Don’t go too far away, and call within the month.”

  “Right.” Charlie lifted his arm but didn’t both to turn around. “I’ll be in touch.”

  He heard Martin chuff with frustration, and regretted having caused it. He liked Martin. But he couldn’t abide another hour in this place. And if he saw Amy again, he’d probably start beseeching her to marry him, and his pride couldn’t stand that.

  Gus, one of the men who’d been assigned to guard Horace Huxtable, agreed to drive Charlie to the small train station near El Monte. So Charlie packed his brother’s old carpetbag, slung it over his shoulder, got into the car, and rode away from the Peerless lot in a cloud of dust. He looked back, although he’d told himself he wasn’t going to, until the tent city disappeared from his sight. Then he sighed.

  “You okay, Charlie?” Gus asked.

  “Yeah,” Charlie said. “Fine.”

  “I’m glad you punched Huxtable. He deserved it a dozen times over.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I hope Peerless never hires him again.”

  “Yeah.”

  Sensing the futility of trying to begin a conversation with Charlie, Gus subsided into quiet. All the way to the train station, the only noises Charlie heard were those of the car’s engine and its tires throwing pebbles up to patter against the underside of the carriage. The pebbles seemed to ping out a rhythm, and he heard Amy’s voice speaking along with them in his head. The voice was saying, “No, no, no,” over and over again.

  When they got to the train station, Charlie bought a ticket on the first train out without determining where it was headed. He shrugged when he read the stub and saw the train’s ultimate destination was Los Angeles.

  Los Angeles was fine with him. He’d never been there. In his present state, one place was as good as another. As long as wherever he went didn’t contain Amy Wilkes, he was satisfied.

  He wondered if he’d every be happy again, and decided it was too soon to think about that. At the moment, his only goal was escape.

  The prospect of going to Chicago, and of seeing Amy at the premier of One and Only crept into his head, and he thrust it aside. Later, he told himself. He’d think about everything later, when he didn’t hurt so much.

  He had a feeling that later was going to be a very long time in the future.

  Nineteen

  Amy awoke and recovered in a world that no longer contained Charlie Fox, at least in her vicinity. It was, therefore, a gray world, a lusterless world, a world in which she could find nothing to interest her. The weather outdoors was sunny and bright and full of life. The weather inside Amy was wintry and bleak and totally barren.

  The day after her fall from the horse, she lay in bed, plucking at the covers, as the Peerless set for One and Only was being dismantled around her. She heard the crew doing the work and thought about going outside so she could witness the activity. She’d surely never have another chance to see how a motion picture set was put up and taken down. In order to do that, however, she’d have to expend some energy to rise from bed, put on some clothes, and walk to the flap of the tent. She didn’t want to see the activity that much. She didn`t want to see anything at all.

  Except, perhaps, one tall, lean, lanky cowboy whom she’d pushed away and might never see again.

  She sighed heavily and turned her face to the side of the tent. The blank side. The side where all she could see was canvas.

  “Amy? Amy, are you awake?”

  With another deep sigh, Amy turned her head at Karen’s soft voice. She truly was glad to see her friend, even if she couldn’t drum up any overt enthusiasm. “Hello, Karen.” She tried to smile, failed, and decided it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered now.

  Karen’s smile was big enough for both of them, although it looked as if she had to force it. She strode over to the bed, yanked off the big straw hat she wore, tossed it aside, and sat with a thump on the chair beside Amy. “Whew! It’s a real mess out there.”

  “I expect so.” Blast. This was no way to talk to her new best friend. With a massive effort, Amy managed to put a little—a very little—spark into her next words. “How long is it going to take to get the whole thing packed up?”

  “I don’t know. Here, I brought you some lemonade. It’s not great, but it’s wet, and I managed to finagle a piece of ice from the cook, so it’s almost cold.”

  Lemonade. Now, there was something Amy could view with slightly more animati
on than if she were a dead cow lying on the desert. She was thirsty. “Thanks, Karen. That sounds good.”

  “Well, it’s not, but it’s wet.”

  “Thanks.” With a good deal of struggle, because her muscles were still sore from the damage they’d sustained the day before, she sat up and took the lemonade glass. She hoped Karen would initiate a conversation since her own mind was a blank. The only topic of conversation that interested her was Charlie Fox, and he was gone.

  “Martin said he’d drive us both home in his Pierce Arrow, so at least we won’t have a miserable bumpy ride in the wagon with the rest of the cast.”

  “That’s nice of him.”

  “He feels guilty about not keeping a better watch on that wretch, Huxtable.”

  Amy would have shaken her head if she’d had the vitality. “That wasn’t his fault. Huxtable alone is responsible for his actions.”

  “I know it. And I suppose Martin does, too, but he still feels bad that he wasn’t able to prevent what happened.”

  Amy managed a tiny shrug. It hurt, but at least it spared her from thinking up a string of coherent words to say.

  “But it’s nice to know that Huxtable won’t be fit to act in any more pictures for a while, so he won’t menace any other poor actresses.”

  “Good.”

  “It is good. And it was Charlie Fox who did it, too. He ought to get a medal.”

  He ought to get more than that. He deserved the world on a platter, and if Amy were worth spit, she’d be there with him. She wasn’t. She tried to tell herself not to be maudlin, but didn’t have the strength of will or body. She lifted her glass and sipped instead.

  The lemonade tasted good, although she was beginning to pin for some of her uncle’s fresh orange juice. Soon. Her uncle was always telling people how beneficial and healthy orange juice was. Maybe a sufficient quantity of orange juice could cure the lovesick blues.

  She doubted it.

  Karen fidgeted in the chair for a second, then rose abruptly and began striding around the tent. Amy watched her, vaguely curious. Suddenly, Karen turned and spoke to her. “Listen, Amy, I don’t know what happened between you and Charlie, but whatever it was must have been bad, but I can’t imagine either one of you doing anything so terrible as to cause such a rift between you. Why, you’re both terrific people, and you’re perfect for each other.”

  Holding her lemonade glass to her warm cheek in order to capture some of its coolness, Amy again turned to the wall. Her heart hurt too much to talk about it. She heard Karen stomp her foot, and she sighed.

  “Will you stop sighing and tell me what happened? For heaven’s sake, Amy, you can’t keep everything inside of you. You’re eating your heart out, and so is Charlie, and now he’s disappeared, and you’re lying here like Camille dying, and it’s stupid! You’re both intelligent people. If you had some sort of problem, certainly you can work it out!”

  Tired, sore, and now feeling beleaguered, Amy turned her head and scowled at her friend. “My love life is none of your business, Karen Crenshaw.”

  “The hell it’s not!”

  Karen’s profane outburst was enough to shock even the wounded Amy out of her lethargy. She gaped at Karen, who blushed. Astonishingly.

  “Dammit,” Karen continued, stomping her foot again, and again shocking Amy, who wasn’t accustomed to hearing young ladies swear. “It’s my business because I care about you. Both of you. It’s my business because I’m your friend. It’s my business because I don’t want friends of mine to be miserable—and you’re both miserable.”

  In reaction to this, Amy pruned up her lips. She was beginning to feel abused as well as wounded and beleaguered, and she didn’t appreciate it. “Nonsense.”

  “It’s not nonsense!” Karen exclaimed. “What happened, Amy? I swear to God, if you don’t tell me, I’ll track down Charlie Fox and make him tell me! Then I’ll hog-tie him and haul him to you and make the two of you talk it out.”

  “Don’t be silly.”

  “It’s not silly.”

  And then Karen did something that so alarmed Amy, she could only gape in wonder for a second. She burst into tears. Amy said, “Stop it, Karen. Please.”

  “Oh, you’re driving me crazy. Both of you! I care so much about you, and you’re both so unhappy, and that makes me unhappy, and I know there’s some bit of nonsense at the bottom of it that if you’d just talk about it, everything would be fine, but you won’t talk to each other, and you won’t talk to anyone else, and Charlie’s run away, and you’re lying there like some expiring heroine in a bad melodrama, and it’s not fair!”

  Although she could sort of appreciate Karen’s point of view, Amy felt it important to point out the obvious to her friend—whom she truly did esteem. “It’s my life, Karen.”

  Karen wiped at her cheek furiously. “I know it. But it’s my life, too, and I value my friends. I don’t have enough of them that I can afford to see one of them making an egregious mistake and not butt in.”

  Amy took in a breath and let it out. That was indeed one of Karen’s most notable characteristics, she supposed: assertiveness. “All right, I appreciate your concern. But I’m not really up to talking about it.”

  “Bother. What else do you have to do?” Karen threw out her arms in an extravagant gesture that dislodged her hat from the bureau on which it had landed. She caught it gracefully and replaced it on the bureau.

  “Recover,” Amy said dully.

  “Right. And I’ll bet you anything that you’d recover a darned sight faster if your heart didn’t hurt so much.”

  Without realizing what she was doing, Amy pressed a hand over her heart, which did ache abominably. Karen, needless to say, saw the gesture and pounced upon it.

  “There!” she said in triumph. “It’s exactly as I said!” She rushed over and sat in the chair again. Taking Amy’s hand in hers, she said, “Please, Amy, talk to me. I’m sure it won’t seem so bad if you let yourself talk about it.”

  “Well....” Actually, it might feel good to unburden herself a little bit. Not about everything. She’d die before she’d admit she’d slept with Charlie Fox before marriage.

  “Please?” Karen pleaded. “I haven’t told you my news yet, but Benjamin has asked me to marry him.”

  “Oh, Karen!” Amy was actually able to drum up some excitement for her friend. She squeezed Karen’s hand. “I’m so happy for you.”

  “I’m happy for me, too. And I want to be happy for you, too. What’s more, I want you to be my maid of honor, and Benjamin wants Charlie to be one of his gentlemen.”

  “My goodness.”

  “But in order for that to happen, the two of you have to be willing to exist in the same space together—at least long enough for the wedding ceremony to take place. As it is now, neither Benjamin nor I feel comfortable about asking the two of you to be together in the wedding party, but you’re the only two we want, besides my sister and Benjamin’s brother.”

  Karen had a point there, Amy guessed.

  “Please, Amy, won’t you give talking a chance? I promise you—I’ll swear on a Bible if you want me to—that it will go no further than the inside of this tent. I won’t even tell Benjamin, if you don’t want me to.”

  Horrified that her secrets might be spread about, Amy spoke before thinking. “Good God, no, don’t tell anyone! Please!”

  Karen held up a placatory hand. “I won’t. I promise.” She crossed her heart. Amy remembered making that gesture when she was little and playing with her friends in Pasadena. The only things she could remember about her life before Pasadena were cold and ice and fright and misery. Which sort of prepared her for the coming ordeal.

  She took an enormous breath, paused to gather her wits, and told Karen almost everything.

  Karen stared at her throughout her recitation and for a long time after she’d stopped talking. After what seemed like a century, Karen said, “I see.” Another stretch of silence ensued; then Karen said, “I hadn’t realized how
deeply your experience in Alaska had hurt you. It really left scars, didn’t it?”

  An all too familiar sensation of helpless dread began to creep through Amy. It always started the same way, with a sinking feeling in her stomach. It worked its way through the entirety of her body, not skipping her heart, until the whole of her felt like a lump of lead—cold, vulnerable, powerless, and unable to think. “Yes.” She shivered in the smothering heat.

  “I see.” Karen tapped her chin with her forefinger. “I’m very sorry, Amy. I’m sure it was an abominable, frightening experience.”

  “It was.”

  “And it’s certainly damaged you, if you’re willing to give up Charlie Fox, who would never in a billion years hurt you, in order to keep protecting the little kid you used to be.”

  Now, there, Amy thought, was an interesting way of looking at it. She tried to resent Karen’s assessment, but it sounded perilously like the truth. “I guess so.”

  Karen got up and slowly circuited the tent, pausing now and then to pick up and put down homey decorative items that Amy had set out here and there. She lifted an old photograph in a silver frame and peered at it closely. “Are these your parents?”

  “Yes.”

  Karen nodded and continued her circuit of the tent, carrying the photograph with her and studying it as she walked. When she got to the flap of the tent, she stopped, lifted the flap and stared outside. Light poured in, and Amy was surprised to see how bright it was. The coldness that had invaded her soul had tricked her into thinking it must be cold outdoors, too, even though it was around noon on a blistering summer day.

  After several minutes of staring, Karen turned, dropped the flap, and held the photograph out in front of her. “You know, don’t you, Amy, that your parents were a couple of darned fools.”

  So startled was she by Karen’s words and tone of voice, which was quite harsh, that Amy jerked and stared at her. “Wh-what? What did you say?”

  “You heard me. Any two people who would take a tiny child into the wilderness without the means to keep her safe are no better than idiots. What’s more, they were lousy parents.”

 

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