She had to find a way to get away from Joe. But how? He hadn't left her for even a moment. But he would have to leave her to go back to the ranch to see if Monty had delivered the money. That's when she would get away. She just hoped it wouldn't be too late.
* * * * *
Betty hadn't said more than three sentences before Monty was racing to the corral for his horse.
"Stop him," Fern said to Madison. "If he goes off like this, somebody's going to get hurt."
"This Joe fella is going to get hurt no matter what I do," Madison said, heading after his brother. "Wait up, I'm coming with you," he called to Monty.
"Then you'd better hurry. I'm not waiting."
"You've got to wait, dammit. I'm not as used to saddling a horse as you are."
Monty threw a blanket and a saddle on a complacent-looking buckskin. "Can you cinch it up?"
"I can," Madison said, jerking both from the back of the buckskin. He eyed the horses in the corral and headed for a lineback dun. "And I might even manage to get in the saddle, but I'd never succeed in making that slug move fast enough to keep up with your mount."
Monty's short bark of laughter eased his worried look. "Watch out. He bites."
"So do I. Didn't you know?"
"I thought you just cut people up with your tongue."
"That, too. I don't want to be thought one dimensional."
"You haven't changed a bit."
"Neither have you. That's why I'm going with you."
"Well you'd better bring a gun."
"Why? As you've just pointed out, my best weapon is my tongue. Yours is your fists."
"Well we'd better get this over before Hen gets back. You know what weapon he prefers."
Madison looked grim. "Do you think he'd shoot to kill?"
"He wouldn't hesitate," Monty said. He swung into the saddle and rode through the gate one of the hands held open for him. Madison rode through on his heels.
"Will they bring her back?" Betty asked Fern.
"Yes. I just hope they don't kill anybody in the process."
"Do you think they would?"
"Oh yes," Fern assured her. "They wouldn't hesitate."
Carlos stared at Monty, his face white. "I don't know where Joe is. I can't believe he would do anything like this. I told him . . . " Carlos's voice trailed off.
"You told him what?" Monty asked.
Carlos clamped his mouth shut.
"Tell me, or I'll beat it out of you."
Madison put a restraining hand on Monty's arm, but Monty shrugged it off. "Habit," he said.
"What did you tell Joe?" Monty asked again. "Considering everything Fern has done for you, the least you can do is help us find her."
"It's the gold," Carlos said. "Joe wants the gold."
"What gold?" Monty asked.
"The gold your father stole."
The number and variety of Monty's curses surprised even Madison.
"There is no gold," Madison said. "There never was any. Why won't you people let that rumor die?"
"But we saw it," Carlos said. "You paid Frank in gold."
"That was Iris's money," Monty explained. "She was afraid the bank might take it if she left it in Texas, so she converted everything into gold. She had three thousand dollars strapped around her waist half the way to Wyoming."
Carlos whistled. "But Joe thought--"
"It doesn't matter what he thought. He was wrong. Now what did you tell him?"
"I told him I wanted no part of it. I'd have been content to work for Iris as a regular hand. I never dreamed she'd make me foreman. When she said she was going to give me half the cattle as well, I told Joe he wasn't to touch her. I told him I'd share everything with him."
"That was mighty generous. The man is a cheater."
"I know he's not easy to like, but Joe has been a good friend." Carlos looked as though he was trying to decide whether to say something. "He helped me out of a bad scrape. I owe him my life."
"Fine, let him kidnap you. That has nothing to do with Iris. We've got to find her."
"He has to have her somewhere on the ranch," Carlos said. "We haven't been anywhere else."
"We can't do anything until the morning," Madison said.
"You can't think I mean to leave Iris in that man's hands all night?"
"I don't think you want to," Madison said, "but since you don't know the country and you soon won't be able to see where you're going, I don't see what you can do about it. The best thing is to have all the men here first thing in the morning and begin a systematic search."
Monty wasn't happy with the plan, but he didn't have anything better to propose. The idea of Iris spending the night at Joe's mercy made him almost too mad to think straight, but he told himself if was ever going to learn to think cool and careful, now was the time. Iris wouldn't be helped if he went crashing into this thing.
"Okay, but be ready at dawn," Monty said and stomped out.
"If Joe should contact you during the night, be very careful what you say," Madison warned.
"What do you mean?"
"Don't tell him you haven't seen us. He might be watching now. Tell him you don't know what we're doing. You might even tell him you think we've gone away to get the money. After all, nobody would keep that much money in a ranch house. You can tell him the best thing for everyone would be for him to turn Iris loose. If he does, I promise we won't do anything to him."
"If he doesn't?"
"No man has ever touched a Randolph woman and lived to tell about it."
"Iris is still a Richmond," Carlos said, a bit defiant.
"She's as good as a Randolph. You tell your friend that. You might also want to whisper a word of warning in his ear."
"And what might that word be?"
"Hen."
* * * * *
"This tastes disgusting," Iris said. She pushed away the plate of greasy food Joe Reardon had given her.
"Then cook it yourself."
"I can't cook," Iris told him. Only when the words were out of her mouth did she realize that was no longer true. She couldn't cook much, but she could cook. "What have you got?" Iris asked getting to her feet.
"Bacon, some flour, dried beef, beans. I don't know. Look."
As Iris looked through the food Joe had carried in the sack over the saddle, she tried to remember everything Betty had told her. She had never cooked a stew, but she had watched Betty.
Finding a pot and settling it over the fire turned out to be a bigger problem than cooking. When the water came to a boil, she dropped in pieces of dried beef and two sliced potatoes. She added salt and some dried tomatoes. She remembered things she had seen Tyler do, so she added a few spices. In about twenty minutes the aroma caused her mouth to water.
"This ain't bad," Joe said, going through his portion before Iris had hardly begun. "You can do all the cooking from now on."
Iris almost laughed at the irony. Never in her life had she been allowed to cook. Not even those who loved her risked eating what she prepared. Now that she was a prisoner of a man who really didn't care if she lived or died, only whether he could get money for her, she was ordered to cook.
"Can you find a turkey?"
"What the hell do you want with a turkey?"
"To cook. I've been hoping someone would shoot one."
"There ain't any turkeys in Wyoming."
"There weren't any cows either just a few years ago. There might be now."
"Are you crazy?" Joe asked. "I never heard anybody carry on about turkeys like that."
"Monty likes turkey. I mean to learn to cook it for him."
"Good. You tell him to hand over the gold, and you can cook all the turkeys you like."
"I keep telling you there isn't any gold."
"We'll see. Now you might as well get some sleep."
Joe showed every sign of settling into his bed right then.
"Aren't you going to see if he's brought the gold?"
"Naw. He won't brin
g it tonight even if he has it. He'll talk to Carlos to make sure we've got you."
"Carlos won't help you. He'll tell Monty where you are."
Iris could find nothing comforting in Joe's laugh. "Carlos and me, we planned this together. You don't think he was taken in by that long-lost-brother act, do you?"
"I don't believe you. He'll help Monty."
"He couldn't if he wanted. He doesn't know about this place."
Iris could believe Carlos didn't know about the cabin. Joe was just the kind of person not to trust his friends. But she couldn't believe Carlos would help Joe to kidnap her. Not even for one hundred thousand dollars in gold.
But what did she know about Carlos? Monty had told her to be careful, to get to know him before she started to depend on him, but she hadn't listened. She had been so happy to find Carlos again, so ready to believe he wanted to restore their relationship as much as she did, she had taken him into her confidence. But she couldn't be sure he would help her instead of Joe. Setting aside the question of one hundred thousand dollars in gold, Carlos and Joe had been friends for a long time. They had probably faced several life-and-death situations together. Wouldn't he have a greater loyalty to Joe than to her?
Maybe, but even though half of one hundred thousand dollars was more than she could offer him, she didn't believe Carlos would double-cross her. She believed he did want to settle down, to make something of his life. She remembered all the evenings they had set talking through dinner, the times they had spent planning what they would do with the ranch, the things they wanted to do when the ranch had finally begun to pay its way.
No, Carlos might have been tempted by the idea at first, but she was certain Joe was acting alone. Carlos would help Monty.
Joe's snoring broke her train of thought.
She was worried about Monty. He wasn't one to stop and consider a problem carefully, especially not when he got mad. He would act and worry about the consequences later. Maybe Madison could convince him it wasn't worth risking his future to shoot Joe Reardon. No, Madison didn't look like a forgiving man. It would have to be Fern. No woman who was a wife and mother would value revenge above the safety of her family.
She just hoped Monty would listen to her.
* * * * *
Carlos paced the tiny cabin. After using every oath he knew at least a half a dozen times each he'd concentrated on calling Joe every epitaph he could think of. Finally, having exhausted his vocabulary, he consulted his feelings.
He didn't want Joe to kidnap Iris. He had grown rather found of Iris. He liked having a sister. He liked her.
He hadn't during all those years Helena have kept him from his home, but he knew it hadn't been Iris's fault. She had welcomed him without a single question about where he had been or what he'd done. She'd shown faith in him from the very first, taken his part against Monty, then divided her inheritance with him. She didn't have to do any of those things. She'd done it because he was her brother, because she wanted some family to love, because she was too decent to inherit from a man who wasn't her father while his real son went penniless. He wondered if he would have been as generous.
Carlos felt like a heel to have even considered Joe's scheme, but now he made up his mind to do something about it. Only he didn't know where Joe had taken Iris. And for the longest time he couldn't figure out where to start looking. Then he remembered Joe had mentioned seeing an abandoned cabin on his way back from selling the remuda. Carlos didn't know where the cabin was, but he knew the route Joe had taken. If Joe had taken Iris there, he would be bound to come across their trail.
Carlos saddled quickly and rode out. He wanted to get to Joe before Monty did. He didn't really trust Joe anymore, but he owed him the chance to change his mind before one of the Randolphs killed him.
* * * * *
"You ought to go to bed," Madison advised Monty. "You'll want to be fresh for the morning."
"I'll be fine. Staying up all night is nothing compared to twenty-hour days in the saddle."
"She'll be all right," Fern assured her brother-in-law. "He can't possibly gain anything by hurting her."
"If I didn't know that, I'd be out there this minute with every man on the place." Monty heaved himself out of the chair. "I'm going for a walk."
"Iris wouldn't want you to go after that man now, and she wouldn't want you to go after him alone."
"Why?"
"Because you'll mean to kill him."
"So?"
"You'll jeopardize your future. And Iris's as well. She'd give him the money herself before she'd let that happen."
"How do you know?"
"That's what any woman would do. Her kidnapper isn't important. Neither is revenge. All she's thinking about is you. Your future together. She's praying you won't do anything to jeopardize it."
Monty was quiet for a moment. "I suppose you're right. That sounds exactly like something Rose would say. But I can't stay here."
"Want some company?" Madison asked.
"No."
"Five minutes?"
"Okay."
"Do you think he'll go after her?" Betty asked when the door closed behind the brothers.
"Of course. He wouldn't be a Randolph if he didn't," Fern answered. "I was only trying to tell him what Iris would want him to do."
"Do you think he listened?"
"I doubt it. He wouldn't be a Randolph if he did."
* * * * *
They walked in silence for three minutes. The night was cold, the sky clear. The moon and stars bathed the landscape in a cold milky whiteness that made it seem other worldly. The gravelly soil crunched under their feet, the sound so much louder in the night. A horse snorted; an owl floated by on silent wings.
"Does George know you bought that ranch?" Madison asked.
"Yes. I sent him a telegram when I asked for the money."
"You didn't have to do that."
"Yeah, I did."
"Why?"
"I was complaining to Salty once, saying I didn't know why everybody was so damned worried about my temper. I said Hen went about shooting people and nobody worried about that."
"What did Salty say?"
"He said they did. They worried a lot. He said the difference was Hen didn't care what people thought of him. Salty said I did, especially George. He said it was George's approval I was trying to win, that and my own."
"Seems you've got yourself a right smart foreman there."
"Yeah, but George is never going to give total approval to anyone. He can't. It's not in him. There'll always be something more I could have done, another way I could have done it better, something I said or did that didn't fit George's sense of what was right."
"So how's your own ranch going to change that?"
"It's not, at least not for George. I won't ever be like George, and it's time I stopped trying. I'll run this place, and I'll do everything I can to please George and the rest of you, but I'm going to do what I damned well please on my own place. I don't say it'll be better, but it'll be just as good. You wait and see."
"I'm sure it will, but that's not why you're walking about in the cold at midnight."
"No. I've been trying to convince myself to be sensible, to wait until the morning. That's what George would advise. It's not what he would do, mind you, but it's what he'd tell me I ought to do. Well I'm not going to do it, dammit. I'm going to saddle Nightmare and take to those hills. I don't know what I can do tonight, but I do know I can't wait until tomorrow. If anything were to happen to Iris and I was lying in that bed, I'd never forgive myself."
"I can't say I blame you. I remember riding into the teeth of a tornado after Fern. Looking back it seems like pure insanity, but at the time it seemed the only thing to do. However, since I'm not used to riding in these, or any other, hills at night, I'll wait for daylight. I'll meet you at the ranch house at the same time."
* * * * *
Madison watched his brother saddle up and ride away. He almost felt guilty for
not going with him, but he didn't remain at the ranch merely to take care of Fern or because he'd been living soft for too long. He was convinced Monty wouldn't find Iris in the dark. It would be tomorrow's search that would uncover the necessary information. With Monty gone, it would be up to him to organize it.
It annoyed him. He hated things like that, but he didn't blame Monty. If it had been Fern, he would have been out there if he'd had to walk.
* * * * *
Iris woke with the feeling something wasn't right. Almost immediately she remembered Joe Reardon had kidnaped her and carried her off to a cabin somewhere in the foothills, but that wasn't the source of her uneasiness. Something else was wrong, but she couldn't figure out what it was.
The snoring. It had stopped. She listened, but she couldn't hear anything, not even the sound of soft breathing. Joe was gone! He had gone to see if Monty had delivered the gold to Carlos. Fool that she was, she had believed him and gone off to sleep. She didn't know what woke her, but she was grateful.
Iris fumbled around in the dark for her boots. She had slept in her clothes. Much to her surprise the door was unsecured. She had known there was no lock, but she had expected him to prop a log against it, something to make sure she didn't escape.
Her horse! He had taken her horse thinking she wouldn't leave. That's where Joe Reardon made a mistake.
The thought of wandering about in those hills at night, even on horseback, scared her badly. Going on foot was crazy, but she wasn't about to stay here. Monty was bound to come for her soon. She must find him before he found Joe. There must not be a fight. She didn't care if Joe got away. She only cared that Monty would be safe.
* * * * *
Monty sat his horse in the yard at Iris's ranch. Now that he was here, what was he going to do? Carlos wasn't at home, and there was no one in the bunkhouse to tell him where he had gone. Monty glanced down at the ground outside the corral. A light frost had begun to form on the ground. When the moonlight reflected off the crystals at just the right angle, he could see the faint outline of hoof prints. One horse. It had to be Carlos. No one else would have left so late at night.
Iris Page 33