“Heroes don’t always look like we expect them to.”
“I never expected you to defend the man. Especially after he ran you out of town.”
“I had a lot of time to think today. It occurs to me that maybe I was wrong about some things.”
Moira stood. “Well, I’ll leave you to your thinking. It’s my turn for watch and I can’t be late or Darcy will pitch a fit.”
He found himself longing for her return. When another moment passed, he let his thoughts drift. John enjoyed the silence for five whole minutes before Pops appeared.
The older man sipped on his ever-present tin cup of coffee. “We’ve gotten the girls outfitted. They’ve set up the tents and worked out a watch list. It’s going to storm tonight. Looks like it’s gonna be a real humdinger. We’ve got extra stakes on the tents in case there’s wind.”
“All right.”
“Look, John. I’m sorry about setting this whole thing into motion. I know you’re sore. And maybe you’re right. After this morning, well, we got real lucky. I can’t help but think if it had been the old crew and us, things might not have gone so well. As it stands, we’re lucky we made it out with our scalps. Maybe it’s too dangerous for these girls out here. But I didn’t see any way of stopping them. And I sure didn’t want them out here alone.”
“I get it.”
“You sure you’re all right?”
“I lost my men, my herd and my horses. One of my orphan crew nearly drowned. I got sprayed by a skunk and can’t see out of my left eye. I assaulted a deputy sheriff and got kicked out of Fool’s End. No mean feat considering it’s a town with as many outlaws as law-abiding citizens. It’s about to rain and I’ve got a leaky tent full of females. Oh, and my slicker is in the fire because it smells like skunk. Other than that, I’m doing all right.”
“It doesn’t sound all right when you say it like that.” Pops rummaged through the drawers lining the sides of the chuck wagon. “You’re starting to sound like Jack before he settled down and relaxed a bit.”
John bolted upright. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Easy there. It don’t mean nothing except you sounded like Jack just then, you know, back before he met Elizabeth. There’s something about a woman that changes a man. Jack was all full of right and wrong. He was all black and white. Always trying to force things his way. Not the sort of fellow who’d marry the widow of an outlaw.”
“He must have changed all right, because that’s just what he did,” John said.
When Jack had set out after their sister-in-law’s killer, he never expected the man would already be dead, or that he’d left a widow and child behind. Jack had fallen in love with the widow and child and brought them back to Paris, Texas. He was definitely a changed man, that was certain.
He and Jack hadn’t gotten along well, before Jack married Elizabeth. They’d grown closer of late. While Jack hadn’t encouraged him to leave after the fight with Robert, he hadn’t questioned his decision to leave either. It was as though Jack understood his need to put some space between him and Robert.
No matter what Jack was like now, John didn’t appreciate the comparison to the “old” Jack. The stubborn, hardheaded Jack.
Pops shook his head and continued his work.
John pressed the backs of his knuckles against his swollen eyes, thankful they weren’t nearly as sore as an hour before. At the low rumble of thunder in the distance, he turned up his collar. They wouldn’t make any progress today. Not with the rain and his green crew. He’d send out the boys in this weather, but he didn’t dare risk the younger girls.
While he enjoyed the rare respite from his duties, a drizzle misted the air. Instead of wind and lightning, the drops were barely more than a haze. The girls disappeared into their tent and John sidled into the narrow space in the center of the chuck wagon, his knees bent against the sideboard. He laced his hands behind his head and stared at the overhang. Pops’s words kept ringing in his ears. He was behaving like Jack. He was forcing the situation into a preordained shape. He was stubbornly jamming the pieces together when he knew good and well the puzzle had changed.
Just because his new crew was different from his old crew didn’t make them better or worse. They were simply different. As the trail boss, it was his job to bring out the best in his men, even if they were women.
It was high time he did his job.
* * *
After the drummer’s exit and after everyone had washed and changed into a fresh set of clothes, they’d made the decision to set out on the trail once more. The clouds had moved north and the rain had let up. The time had gone past one in the afternoon, but Moira figured some progress was better than no progress. Even Hazel could tell John was chafing at the bit. Despite the Indians and the skunk, he’d made the decision to press onward.
The rest of the day passed beneath the monotonous drone of flies and the plodding of hoofbeats. The terrain remained even and unchanged, the horizon a faint line in the distance. Once she’d jerked upright, realizing she’d fallen into a slight slumber.
Tony circled around. “Look sharp. No sleeping on the job.”
Moira yawned. “I always thought falling asleep in the saddle was a tall tale. I think different now.
Clouds covered the sun and kept the air cool. Moira’s horse mostly took the lead. Better trained than her, the horse seemed to realize when one of the cattle was about to stray out of line. After what seemed like hours, John lifted his fisted hand and called them to a halt.
Moira slumped. “How far was that?”
“About six miles.”
“Six? Is that all? Seems like we’ve gone fifty.”
“We lost half the day. That’s half the distance.”
Since they’d had an easy day, she wasn’t near as sore as she’d been the first. Already her muscles were accommodating the change in activity. That evening they gathered around the campfire. They’d rotated the watch backward from the night before, which meant Sarah had the first watch and Moira the last.
The air had a chill and Pops added extra logs to the fire, building the flames higher than normal. The sun sank in the distance, leaving behind the darkened haze of twilight.
Tony splayed out, her feet stretched toward the warmth, her head propped on a saddle. “You know what this night needs? Some good scary stories.”
“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” Moira said. “You girls won’t sleep a wink after a round of scary stories.”
“Nah.” Tony had perked right up with the idea. “We’ll be fine.”
“I love scary stories,” Darcy added.
Hazel plopped down. “Me too.”
“Good.” Tony grinned. “I’ll get started. Everyone gather around.”
The girls giggled and pulled their rough wool blankets around their shoulders against the cold.
“Go on,” Hazel urged. “Tell us the story.”
“I heard tell why all the soil in the Indian Territory is red,” Tony whispered.
Even Darcy leaned in closer. “How come?”
Tony spread her arms. “A thousand years ago, a great monster roamed the plains.”
“What did it look like?” Hazel gasped.
“It was big as a two-story building.” Tony gauged her rapt audience. “As big as a four-story building. It was black as night, with enormous claws like a bear and horns that stretched as wide as main street. It had razor-sharp fangs as tall as a grown man, that stuck out of its jaws. The beast roamed the plains in the dark of night, searching for prey. The monster ate buffalo like they were no bigger than spring peas. And everywhere the beast hunted, the blood of its victims spilled on the earth and left the whole territory red.”
“Oooh.” Hazel wrinkled her nose. “What happened to the beast?”
“Don’t know
. Maybe it’s still around.”
“That’s dumb.” Darcy scoffed. “That’s not even a scary story.”
“You got a better one?”
“I heard a whole family in Mississippi was murdered with an ax—”
“That’s a tale for another time,” John broke in. “Moira’s right. You won’t sleep a wink with that kind of talk.”
A coyote howled in the distance. The girls shivered and huddled closer. “Are we in danger?”
“Nah,” the cowboy continued. “It’s probably just the Ivory Coyote.”
“What’s that?” Hazel sat up straighter.
“The Indians say every five hundred years an Ivory Coyote is born. Its fur is as white as an elephant’s tusk and its eyes are as red as a garnet. See, the coyotes never howled until the most recent Ivory Coyote was born, must be going on two or three hundred years ago.”
“They live that long?”
“They live for five hundred years.”
A stump popped in the fire, collapsing in a shower of embers. The air around the flames shimmered in a mirage, turning everything outside their vision hazy and muddled.
Moira rubbed her upper arms.
Tony kicked back on her saddle pillow. “What started them howling, then?”
“Well, a bunch of settler children found the Ivory Coyote and her litter of pups. They’d never seen the like before. It was too tempting. When the Ivory Coyote went out hunting that night, they stole the pups away.”
“They stole her pups?” Hazel exclaimed. “That’s so sad.”
“Is that why she’s howling then?” Darcy asked. “For her lost pups?”
“Those coyotes will howl for another two-hundred years, until the next Ivory Coyote comes to take its place.”
“That still ain’t scary.” Darcy huffed. “Who cares if some old coyote is howling for her lost pups?”
“Because she’s also looking for revenge.”
Moira turned. “What kind of revenge?”
“She snatches the settler’s children.”
The cowboy goosed Hazel in the arm. The little girl shrieked and giggled. The girls yelped and laughed.
“I knew you were only fooling.” Darcy grumbled.
Drawn toward the commotion, Champion trotted into the firelight. The animal wove its way among the girls, sniffing each one in turn, as though assuring their safety. Once satisfied with the inspection, Champion lay near Moira, pressing its entire body against the length of her thigh.
She stiffened and held her hands out of reach. Champion rested his snout on her knee and stared at her with velvety-brown eyes. She cautiously brought down one hand, gently stroking the top of the dog’s head.
Hazel crawled closer and scratched behind the animal’s ear. “He likes it when you do this.”
Moira repeated the gesture on the opposite ear. If she didn’t know better, she’d think the dog was grinning at her.
“See,” Hazel said. “He’s smiling.”
Moira studied the girls. They’d worked hard over the past two days, stretched beyond their skills.
Hazel tired of petting the dog and joined Tony. They played a game, clapping their hands together and repeating a singsong rhyme.
“My mother told me to open the door,
But I didn’t want to.
I opened the door, he fell through the floor,
That silly old man from China.
My mother told me to take off his coat,
But I didn’t want to.
I took off his coat, and out jumped a goat.
That silly old man from China.”
Moira shivered. John leaned over, extending his hand, the handle of a tin cup full of Pop’s ubiquitous coffee clutched between his fingers.
“You cold?”
“No.” Moira wrapped her fingers around the cup for warmth. “It’s the rhyme. I never did like the words.”
“My mother told me to take off his hat,
But I didn’t want to.
I took off his hat, and out jumped a cat.
That silly old man from China.”
John shrugged. “Seems simple enough to me.”
Darcy joined the group, and Hazel and Tony rearranged to accommodate her.
The three resumed their clapping with another song.
“Three sailors went to sea, sea, sea
To see what they could see, see, see,
But all that they could see, see, see,
Was the bottom of the deep blue sea, sea, sea.”
John caught her gaze. “How are you holding up?”
“I’ve never been more miserable,” she answered truthfully. “Or more satisfied. I’m exhausted, sore, and my hands are raw. I’ve got an itchy sunburn on the tip of my nose and the back of my neck. I’m more tired than I ever recall being in my life, yet I’m not ready for sleeping. I want to be right here, under the stars, listening to the girls play and laugh.”
Something inside her was shifting. Her beliefs about herself, about the world. She’d set out with a goal: find her brother, reunite their family. The steps in her life had been simple and straight. She wasn’t the sort of woman who drove cattle or told scary stories around a fire.
“I think I understand what you’re saying. A hard day’s work can make a man feel useful. Needed.”
“Not always.” Moira sipped her coffee and recalled her life with the Giffords. “Did you know it takes three different kinds of leaves to make a proper cigar?”
“Nope. I did not know that. You don’t seem the type of woman to imbibe.”
“It’s how the Giffords earned their money.”
“The foster family that took you in?”
Moira nodded. “Mr. Gifford never had much of a job. He was always looking for a way to get rich quick. They had a maid and a cook because everyone who was anyone in St. Louis had a maid and a cook. They took in Tommy and me because they didn’t have their own children, and children made a man look respectable. That’s what Mr. Gifford said, anyway. Success and fame were always just around the corner for Mr. Gifford. In a way I suppose I admired his optimism. No matter how many times his schemes failed, he was always ready for another. Always staying one step ahead of the debtors.”
“That’s not optimism. That’s idiocy.”
“The cigars were his one, steady source of income. The tobacco farms paid us piecemeal.”
She pictured his gold watch, the links of the chain stretched between his brocade-vest pockets. The steady tick, tick, tick. The monotony that gave her too much time for thinking. Too much time for dreaming.
Tick, tick, tick.
“That’s how your foster family earned a living then, rolling cigars?”
“No.” Moira stood and dusted her pant legs. “Mrs. Gifford didn’t like how the tobacco left her fingers yellowed. Mr. Gifford felt he lacked the dexterity for such delicate work. Which meant the work fell to Tommy and me.”
She laughed, the sound hollow even to her own ears. “I suppose it seems perfectly normal to you. Growing up on a ranch, you must have worked hard. Even as a child.”
“I suppose,” John began. “But what you’re speaking of sounds more like child labor than chores. Is that what you were talking about earlier? When you said you’d like to right a wrong.”
“Something like that.”
She couldn’t admit what she’d done. The more she knew about the cowboy, the less she wanted him to know about her life. She wanted him to like her, to respect her. He might regret kissing her, he certainly hadn’t brought up the subject, but she didn’t want him to regret knowing her. She’d gotten him all wrong from the beginning.
He might be separated from his family, but at least he hadn’t betrayed them.
Chapter Thirteen
Two nights later, following supper, the girls lounged around the fire once more. In a few short days they’d fallen into a regular routine. They went about their chores without fuss. Most of the animosity from the first few days had withered away beneath the weight of exhaustion. John was even growing accustomed to the improvement in the food.
Hazel sat cross-legged, her elbows propped on her knees, her chin cradled in her hands. “Why aren’t you married yet?”
“Well, uh. I’m just not,” John replied.
Tony whittled at a stick. “She means, what’s wrong with you?”
“Nothing is wrong with me. Why would you think something is wrong with me?”
“You’re a good-looking fellow. Got yourself a nice herd of cattle. You’re plenty old enough. Why ain’t you got a wife and kids by now?”
He caught Moira watching him and a flash of heat crept up his neck. “I guess I haven’t found the right lady yet.”
“Or you’re not looking.”
“I think he’s doing something wrong.” Tony eyeballed the sharpened end of her stick. “Maybe you’re not approaching things the right way.”
“What things?” John glanced around. “I’m not approaching anything. I just haven’t gotten around to courting anyone yet.”
“You better get around to it soon,” Tony replied. “You’re not getting any younger. And where you’re going, there’s not too many available women.”
“How do you know?”
“Well, it stands to figure. The farther west you go, the fewer women. My pa used to say, there’s a woman behind every tree in Kansas. Both of ’em.”
“Well, I don’t see the need to force anything.” John didn’t like the direction of this conversation. Lately he’d been thinking more and more about settling down, having a family of his own. He didn’t need the girls goading him. “If the right woman comes along, well, we’ll see.”
Pops appeared in the firelight, a tin of raw bread dough in his hands. “What about that girl you was dating back in Texas?”
The Cattleman Meets His Match Page 18