by Montana West
Even within her grief soaked isolation, Leyla occasionally allowed herself to wonder just why Chase hadn’t left with the rest of the traveling western show. Surely the show meant everything to him, didn’t it?
The problem with those thoughts was that they eventually brought up the possibility that Chase had let the show move on without him and that he had stayed behind in order to try and apologize to her. The thought that she had made him give up that life he loved so much for her sake made Leyla feel like crying even more.
At some point, exhausted from all of her crying, worrying, and wondering, she had fallen asleep. She had awoken to find it dark outside and a plate of food left on her bedside table, evidence that her mother had come and gone while she had been sleeping.
Though the food was lukewarm at best, it still helped her feel slightly better following all of the energy she had expended since the afternoon focusing on her anger and sadness. Once she was finished, she decided that dressing for bed would be the wisest move to make. Despite having slept for the better part of the afternoon and evening, she still felt exhausted.
She made short work of shedding her day clothes and replacing them with one of her nightgowns, the light material perfect for sleeping in the warm temperatures of late summer on the plains.
Her hair was a matted mess. She retrieved her brush from her bureau, opened her window as high as it would go, and then sat on the windowsill brushing her hair beneath the light of the moon and stars.
I wonder where Chase is right now? she pondered, feeling neither anger nor sadness as she drew the brush through her lustrous hair, taking care to readjust whenever she encountered a knot or a tangle. Maybe he actually has left and is trying to catch up with the rest of the show. They’ve gotta be in Laramie by now.
The night was quiet, the only sounds coming from the crickets chirping in the grasses and the occasional sound of a moo from a steer in one of the nearby pens. In many ways, it mirrored Leyla’s current internal situation—quiet after what was a restless day.
She was just preparing to return to her bed when she heard something that was entirely unexpected—singing. Cocking her head to the side and pulling her ear back, she could definitely hear the distinct sound of a man singing something in what sounded like Spanish.
Who could that be? she wondered in slight alarm, quickly running through the mental list of Mexicans employed by the ranch. It’s not deep enough to be Miguel, and not gravelly enough to be Marco.
The tune itself was quiet, almost as though it were being carried on the breeze in a gentle caress. The more Leyla listened to it, the more she started picking out other little clues about the singer.
He sings beautifully, but I’ve heard enough Spanish to know it’s not his native language, she deduced, trying to discern more and more from the song. Indeed, despite how well the singer was carrying the song, he stumbled in a few places. Still, it was a beautiful melody all the same and she found herself being slowly mesmerized by it.
She was just about to slide out of the window and take a look to see just who it was when the singer appeared around the corner of the homestead, his identity clearly visible in the bright moonlight.
There stood Chase McAllister, his shirt unbuttoned and exposing his muscular chest and his long brown hair left to flutter in the gentle night winds. He was singing the Spanish song and he nearly stopped when he spotted Leyla hanging out of her window in search of the mysterious singer.
Leyla’s breath caught in her throat at the sight of him. Once more, the heat and passion of the memories of what they’d done came flooding back to her, but this time neither sadness nor anger followed with them. If nothing else, it was intrigue that made itself known this time.
Just what are you playing at, Chase? she wondered as Chase continued to serenade her with the song that was haunting and sweet all at once.
SHE’S EVEN MORE BEAUTIFUL than before, Chase thought dreamily as he spied Leyla McNeal perched on her windowsill clad in a simple flowing nightgown with her long red hair let down in a cascade.
Still, the show rider focused on the song that he was singing, hastily learned from Phillipe and practiced as much as he could in the time that it took him to ride from Cheyenne back to the McNeal Ranch.
Getting back onto the ranch had been relatively easy, but as he drew closer to the homestead, Chase realized that, once again, he had failed to think his plan all the way through. Though he rode Cannonball as quietly as he could onto the McNeal’s land, he had no idea what to do with his trusty steed after he’d reached the homestead. The house had been dark, so he took a chance and hitched his horse to the post in front before making his way around and beginning his song.
He had figured that singing as loudly as possible in the middle of the night was a good way to get himself into trouble, so he started by singing quietly as he made his way around in the hopes of stumbling onto the window that was Leyla’s. As for the open shirt baring his chest to God and everyone else, the idea had been Phillipe’s.
“Is muy romantic, boss,” he recalled the tanned rider explaining. “Back in Mexico, a cabron who bares his chest when he sings is baring his heart to the world.”
You better not have been lying to me about that Phillipe, Chase mentally noted.
Still, he had located Leyla and the two were now locked with one another’s gaze as Chase continued to sing sweetly to her, the words, though rough in parts, coming naturally as though he had been singing the song for years.
LEYLA’S INITIAL SURPRISE at Chase’s appearance in the middle of the night was slowly tempered as she listened to him sing more and more. Despite the incongruity of the entire situation, she couldn’t help but listen to him continue singing.
What words she could pick out—such as “luna” and “amor”—told her that the song had something to do with the moon and love. Though she could only understand a little of its meaning, she listened with every bit of hearing she had.
The song finally came to an end with a sustained note that Chase held for ten seconds. As he drew in a breath to replace what he’d lost, he looked up at Leyla expectantly, something akin to hope shining in his eyes.
With the song no longer lulling her into docility, Leyla gave her head a shake as the emotions that had been ruling her for the better part of the last two days returned in full force. She narrowed her eyes at Chase in a fierce stare that would have easily rivaled anything that her mother or sister could produce.
“What are you doing here, Chase?” she hissed, trying to keep her voice down as best she could. “I thought I told you to never come back her again and go back to your wife.”
The word “wife” seemed to hit Chase like a physical blow and he winced as she all but spat it out. But the show rider gathered his resolve and met Leyla’s heated stare with his own apologetic one.
“Leyla, please just give me a chance,” he whispered in a pleading tone. “I’m sorry that I didn’t tell you the entire truth about me, but I was trying to forget about that part of my life as well. Not telling you the truth was wrong and I’m real sorry about it, but please let me make it up to you.”
“Are you married?”
“No.”
“But she ‘ent dead, I heard you tell John that she wasn’t dead.”
Chase shook his head.
“Either she’s dead or she’s still your wife, Chase McAllister!” Leyla crossed her arms over her chest. “Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t scream and wake everyone from here to the next county up.”
She should have just told him to leave. She should gave gotten Maggie’s shotgun when she heard the first notes of his love song, but for whatever Chase’s faults, he had come back. She needed to hear his reasoning, his side of it, before she washed her hands and sent him packing.
If she sent him packing.
Foolish, naïve girl.
Chase reached up and scratched the back of his neck in an awkward manner. “I know I hurt you bad, Leyla,” he began earnest
ly. “And I promise that it was never my intention to hurt you. All of our lessons together were real and when you agreed to perform in the show with me, I felt like I was flying like an eagle. Once you know everything there is to know about me, then you can decide whether you want me to stick around or hit the trail.” He was pleading now, and it softened her heart all the further. “I’ll do whatever you want me to do if you’ll please just give me a chance.”
“Before I do anything, tell me something: why aren’t you heading further west with the rest of the show?” she asked.
Chase looked down at the ground momentarily, but when his head tipped back up he was wearing a sheepish smile on his face.
“You might think I’m crazy, Leyla, but I think somebody up there likes me,” he whispered. “The truth is I was travelling west with the rest of the show this morning, resigned to probably never being able to see you again and make up for my mistake, when the whole dang engine threw a fit and busted before we were even out of Cheyenne!”
“Oh my!” Leyla squeaked, her hands flying up to cover her mouth in order to silence herself lest her mother or sister hear her. “Was anybody hurt?!”
Chase shook his head in the negative. “No, nobody was hurt and that was a miracle if ever there was one, but the mechanics told the professor that the train isn’t going anywhere for four days or so.”
A spark of anger flared to life inside Leyla’s mind at the knowledge that his coming back was all due to a coincidence. “So you only came back because you had nothing better to do for the next four days, is that it?” she accused venomously, her eyes burning like hot coals once more.
“Confound it, woman, no!” Chase defended. “I genuinely wanted to explain myself and it looked like the Good Lord himself gave me the opportunity to do so!”
“Then explain.”
“Well—“
“Wait.” Leyla held up a hand to interrupt him. John would be back soon, and as furious as she was at Chase, she didn’t want him dead in front of the house. Especially if Maggie heard them. It was a miracle the singing hadn’t woken the rest of the household. “Not here, Chase,” she whispered, looking around to see if anyone had spotted them. “We’ll go somewhere where Maggie is less likely to spot us. Did you ride here? Where’s Cannonball?”
“I hitched him quiet as a church mouse around the front when I arrived,” he explained, keeping his voice just as quiet.
“How did nobody see you?” Leyla asked, wondering where all of the ranch hands could be.
“Another stroke of good luck for me,” Chase whispered with a grin. “Just as I was getting ready to come back here, I saw Mister Baldwin and at least a dozen of the ranch hands ride into town and go into one of the saloons. From what I could tell, looks like the hands and your sister planned him a celebration in honor of his engagement. Probably won’t be back ‘til morning.”
“You go fetch Cannonball and bring him back around here,” she ordered quietly. “Nothing moves inside the stable without Maggie knowing about it, so I can’t get Whirlwind out. We’ll just have to share a saddle on Cannonball.”
“Right, right,” Chase agreed. “Won’t be but a minute.” And with that he sprinted quietly back around to fetch his horse.
Leyla sighed as she realized what she was about to do. Here she was in the middle of the night, and she was about to go riding off into the night with a man who had already lied to her once.
Well, I guess he didn’t lie so much as he didn’t tell the whole truth, she conceded. But that’s not much better. This better be a good story, Chase McAllister.
Quickly slipping into a pair of riding trousers and a loose shirt, she grabbed her hat, put on her boots and carefully climbed out through her bedroom window.
Thank Heaven that no one has heard us, she thought gratefully.
AS SLOWLY AND AS QUIETLY as he possibly could, Chase unhitched Cannonball from the post he had secured him to and led him back around the homestead to Leyla’s window. He arrived to find her hastily dressed in riding breeches, a loose shirt, and her hair pinned up with a few tresses escaping to frame her face. She had a shotgun slung over her back.
He couldn’t help but stop and stare a moment.
Leyla quickly noticed his gawking and she flushed in a combination of embarrassment and indignation. “This is my sister’s shotgun, and I know how to use it, so don’t think of trying anything.”
“My apologies, Leyla,” he whispered, his own cheeks reddening from being caught staring.
Again, keeping as quiet as he possibly could, Chase mounted Cannonball’s saddle and drew himself up into it. Once he had his feet secured in the stirrups, he turned slightly and lifted Leyla up and behind him so that she sat behind him.
“You sure you don’t mind riding back there?” he asked, his concern plain as day in his voice.
Leyla simply nodded and without another word Chase quietly spurred Cannonball forward and a gentle trot toward the eastern pasture.
Chapter VIII: Reunited — And It Feels Too Good
MCNEAL RANCH LAND, Near Cheyenne, Wyoming Territory, August 1885
The eastern pasture of the McNeal ranchland was as still and quiet as the interior of some grand church, even the sounds of Mother Nature herself fading into a low hush as though all were afraid to even dare to disturb the almost sacred silence. In the far distance, McNeal Hill stood proud and defiant, a wordless vanguard watching over the lower plains that it offered such a commanding view of.
There was not a soul to be found for what may as well have been miles around. That is, until the steady beat of a horse’s hooves came pattering along, two riders perched atop the mighty steed’s stout back. Though the rhythm of the horse’s movement was decidedly a breach of the previously unbroken silence, it was a minor transgression at best. The low thump of each one of the horse’s four legs was merely a dull thud in the silence of the night, disappearing as quickly as it had come and could hardly have been said to have been there in the first place.
Leyla and Chase had ridden out in complete silence, both of them trying to find words to fill the time between their departure from the McNeal homestead and their destination in the grove of trees situated in the eastern pasture. Leyla’s arms remained fastened around Chase’s muscular chest like a lifeline.
Despite the somewhat gentle candor the two had achieved back at the homestead when Chase had first appeared and serenaded Leyla with a lovely Spanish song, neither of them still had a definite idea of what the other was expecting from this.
However, both of them knew one truth that was etched in stone: the future of their relationship would be determined that night, for better or for worse.
IT’S ALMOST LIKE FATE has brought us back here, Leyla mused as she slid from Cannonball’s back and hit the ground amongst the grove of trees.
But instead of a picnic, the two had returned to the site so that they might decide their future.
Chase tied Cannonball’s reins to the same branch that he had used previously, making sure that his mount wouldn’t be going anywhere without his say so. Once he was certain the horse wouldn’t be wandering off, he pulled what looked like a warm but still useful blanket that he had bundled up in a roll from the saddle.
Leyla thought his choice of bringing a blanket along strange at first. After all, the August heat of the day ensured that there was plenty of warmth left lingering throughout the night. However, when Chase unrolled the blanket and spread it out beneath the same tree they had shared their picnic, she realized what he was up to: he wanted them to be able to sit while they talked of his past.
With a slight degree of hesitance, Leyla made her way over to the blanket and sat down upon it, tucking her legs beneath herself. The blanket’s threadbare texture beneath her fingers made her wonder just how long Chase had been in possession of the piece.
Once she was in a fairly comfortable position, Chase mimicked her actions and lowered himself onto the blanket, sitting opposite of Leyla and just trying to adju
st his bearings.
Again, the two settled into a thick silence as both of them waited for the other to make the first move.
With the draw of a deep breath into his body, Chase decided to open the dialogue. “What would you like to know first?” he asked, his face still showing signs of worry at what he was about to do.
Leyla pondered the question for a moment, her head tilting slightly as she gave the matter some thought. When she finally decided on a course, she came right out with it. “Let’s start from the beginning: who are you and where did you come from?”
Chase nodded as he drew in another breath. “All right, Leyla,” he began quietly, looking her directly in the eye as he spoke. “My real name is Charles McAllister, but as far back as I can remember everybody has always called me Chase. I was born near Springfield, Illinois, just before the war started. My mama died when I was real young and my daddy was a blacksmith who liked to drink. He wasn’t violent about it, but it sure didn’t help the income none. I stayed in school and learned what I could, at least enough to read and write some. My daddy died when I was about 12 years old, and I started wandering around trying to make my own way.”
Leyla tried with all of her might to keep her eyes from betraying the well of emotions that was rising up inside of her heart. Oh my poor, poor Chase, she thought sadly. All this time and you’ve never had a real home? No wonder you didn’t want to talk about it.
Chase, sliding deeper and deeper into the fog of his memories and extracting what he could, pushed forward. “I worked a lot of odd jobs between my daddy’s death and when I finally wound up in Cheyenne. And I’m not proud to admit, Leyla McNeal, that there were more than a few times where I had to steal just to survive.”
Leyla’s eyes must have given her shock at the admission away as Chase quickly held up his hands in apology. “Don’t get the wrong idea, now,” he said, trying to assuage her sudden concerns about his thieving. “It was more like pocketing apples or potatoes from the general stores and the occasional piece of meat cooling on a window sill. I pray God forgives me, and I never hurt nobody just to make sure my own stomach stayed full. That’s the full truth.”