“I don’t understand,” her mother said. “Your father told me cows take care of themselves. We only have to sell them when they’re big enough.”
Amanda was relieved when a knock on the front door prevented her from having to explain to her mother again that cows really didn’t take care of themselves.
Eddie was off like a flash and back a moment later ahead of their unexpected guest. “It’s Corby.” He didn’t look any more pleased than Amanda at the interruption, but Gary welcomed Corby. Her mother’s face was unreadable, but Amanda knew her mother didn’t approve of Corby. Amanda wondered whether she disapproved more of the way he dressed or that he owned a saloon.
“I came as soon as I heard,” he said. “I told the sheriff he ought to put that man in jail. He said he would if the fellow gave you any trouble.”
“What are you talking about?” Amanda asked. “Who are you talking about?”
“The man who took you home the other night. He’s been talking to the sheriff,” Corby answered.
“He went to the sheriff about us?” Gary’s face turned dark red. “I’ll kill the son of a bitch.”
“I don’t trust the man myself,” his mother said to him, “but you will not use such language at my table. What did Mr. Kincaid say to the sheriff?” she asked Corby.
“He told him you owed a lot of money and that Judge Pike was coming to auction off everything you owned if the debt wasn’t paid. The sheriff said he even threatened him.”
“I can’t believe that,” Amanda said. “Whatever mistakes Broc has made, he’s not a fool.”
“He is if he thinks he’s going to get us to pay a debt we don’t owe,” Gary said.
“If he’s got a judge on his side, that could be trouble,” Corby said. “We all know what Reconstruction people are like. I could tell you—”
“Don’t,” Amanda said. “It would upset Mother. I appreciate your coming to see us, but Mr. Kincaid said we weren’t to give him any money and that we should send someone to Crystal Springs to look into the matter.”
“One person can lie as well as another,” Corby said. “It won’t make any difference that this Pike is a judge. That’s why I’ve come to offer to marry you so I can protect the whole family.”
Considering the times, Amanda supposed quite a few women had received more unflattering proposals, but she didn’t personally know any. If Corby thought offering to protect her family from a flimsy threat would win her over when she’d refused all his previous offers of marriage, he understood her even less than she’d thought. But then Corby had never shown any real understanding of her—or a desire to acquire any. After her father’s death, he’d assumed he would be the one she turned to in times of need, the natural choice to become her husband. Every time she turned him down, he came up with a new reason why she should marry him. This time, however, he’d miscalculated. Not even Gary liked the idea of Corby assuming the role of protector of the family.
“We can take care of ourselves,” Gary said. “I can handle Kincaid by myself.”
“No, you can’t,” Eddie said.
“I can, too,” Gary insisted. “Just because I don’t get into brawls don’t mean I can’t fight.”
Amanda knew they should move into the parlor, but that would be an invitation for Corby to sit and stay longer. “This is a legal matter, not one to be settled by fists.”
“It would settle his big mouth.”
“I’ve made it plain to him that I want him out of town as soon as possible,” Corby said. “He says he has business with Carruthers and Sandoval, but if he’s lying, I’ll see he’s sorry.”
Amanda had a strong suspicion Broc could take either Gary or Corby. “I appreciate your offer of help,” she said to Corby, “but we can handle this by ourselves.”
“There’s no reason you should have to,” Corby insisted. “I want to marry you. I want to take care of things for you. And your family,” he added as an afterthought.
“My daughter is too young to marry,” Mrs. Liscomb said.
Amanda appreciated her mother’s help, but she wasn’t going to hide behind anyone. “I’m not too young,” she told Corby. “I just don’t want to get married yet.”
Okay, she was hedging, but it didn’t seem necessary to hurt his feelings by telling him she would never marry him. She’d already told him she didn’t love him. He said love was an invention of people who wrote poetry and silly plays to fill young girls’ heads with a lot of nonsense. He believed respect and admiration were the feelings on which successful marriages were founded.
“You should think of your family,” Corby said. “They need a man to guide them as well as protect them.”
“I don’t need nobody to protect me,” Eddie insisted.
“You shouldn’t confuse an offer of assistance with an offer of marriage,” her mother said. “It complicates one and undervalues the other.”
“I’ve offered to marry Amanda many times before. I hoped this situation would make her think more about her future and less about the present.”
Corby couldn’t get it through his head that she was refusing him because she was thinking of her future and didn’t want to spend it with him.
“I’d never marry anyone just to get out of a difficult situation,” Amanda said. “Once the situation resolves itself, what reason would I have for wanting to stay married?”
“Security,” Corby said.
“Your vows,” her mother added.
Gary winked and made a silly face, which was his way of saying he thought the physical side of marriage was an inducement all its own.
“I don’t want to be in a marriage where that’s all that keeps me with my husband,” Amanda told her mother and Corby. “I want to love the man I marry. I want him to depend on me as much as I depend on him.”
“Why?” Gary asked.
Her mother and Corby just stared at her as though bereft of speech.
“Why not?” Amanda replied
“Gary likes Priscilla because she’s rich.” Eddie hid behind his mother before his brother could grab him.
“I do not,” Gary insisted. “I mean, that’s not the only reason.” Gary could be a slacker, but at least he was straightforward about it.
“I’m just saying that women want to be married to men they like and enjoy being with,” Amanda said.
“You like me and enjoy being with me,” Corby said.
“I know, but that’s not enough for me. I just told you I want to be in love with the man I marry.
“You’re nineteen,” Gary said, “and you haven’t found anybody you love yet. What if you never do?”
Amanda had thought about that on many lonely nights, but she believed not being married was better than being married to the wrong man. “Nineteen isn’t old,” she told Gary. “I doubt I’ll wind up an old maid aunt to your children.”
“How about my children?” Eddie asked.
“You won’t have any children,” Gary said. “No woman would marry you.”
“I don’t want to get married,” Eddie said. “Girls are afraid of horses.”
“Priscilla isn’t,” Gary said.
“Sammy Loftus says she only rides in a buggy,” Eddie told him. “She won’t even harness her own horses.”
“You’re a liar.” Gary grabbed for Eddie, who escaped by diving under the table and hiding behind Amanda.
“I’ll spare you my brothers’ embarrassing behavior and refuse your kind offer. We really can handle the situation on our own.”
“I haven’t given up.” Corby gave Amanda his most engaging smile. “I’ll keep the offer open because you’ll need me soon. Now I do have to get back to town. I’m never comfortable leaving the saloon for long.”
Amanda wondered if he realized he was already married—to the saloon.
“I’ll see you out,” Gary said to Corby.
“It would have been nice to have the security he could provide,” Mrs. Liscomb said to Amanda after Corby had left, “but I
can’t like a man who dresses so badly.”
Unwilling to laugh in her mother’s face, Amanda said, “I want to make sure Gary doesn’t keep Corby standing on the porch forever. He’s nearly as bad as Corby when it comes to that saloon.”
“I don’t understand this liking for low company,” Mrs. Liscomb said. “There was nothing like that in my family.”
Amanda didn’t have to go outside to hear what Gary was saying. The front window was open, and he was making no attempt to keep his voice down.
“Don’t give up,” he was saying to Corby. “She’ll marry you as soon as she gets tired of this ranch.”
“She can have the ranch, too,” Corby said. “I just want to marry her.”
“I don’t know why my mother ever wanted this place. I hate it.”
“I can see why your mother likes this house,” Corby said, “but it’s too far from town for my taste.”
“Just keep after Amanda. I know she likes you. She thinks everybody in the world is crazy about her. Once she starts to look old, she’ll change her mind.”
It was all Amanda could do to refrain from bursting through the doorway and setting her brother straight on quite a number of things, but she wanted to hear Corby’s response. She would deal with Gary later.
“Do I look like a man who wants a wife who looks old?” Corby attempted to puff out his skinny chest, but the effort yielded barely visible results. “I deserve the best-looking wife, because I’m the best-looking man in Cactus Bend.”
Broc’s image sprang into Amanda’s mind. Most people would think she was crazy, that his disfigurement would make it impossible for a woman to think he was attractive. She didn’t like the scarring because of the pain and suffering it must have caused Broc, but she thought it gave him character, a kind of strength nearly every man she met lacked. She just couldn’t understand his part in the attempt to gouge money from her family.
“Sure you are,” Gary told Corby, “which is why Amanda will change her mind. Just give her time.”
She wasn’t going to change her mind as long as she couldn’t get a certain cowhand out of it.
“Where is she going to find a more suitable husband?” Corby asked. “I could have any woman within a hundred miles, but I want only Amanda.”
“You’ll get her. I’m sure of it,” Gary said. “Once she marries you, Ma won’t have anybody to help her on the ranch and she’ll have to sell it. Mr. Carruthers says he’ll give her any price she wants.”
Only because he was determined to get the ranch instead of Sandoval.
“I’ll hire extra cowhands if Amanda will marry me.”
“Don’t! Then Ma will never sell, and I’ll be stuck here forever. Priscilla will never speak to me as long as Ma and Amanda think everything that happens is her father’s fault.”
Amanda felt sorry for Gary. Priscilla Carruthers was a nice girl, but even if she had been interested in Gary, Amanda was certain her father wouldn’t allow his only daughter to throw herself away on a bartender.
“Earl Carruthers is one of the most outstanding men in the county,” Corby said.
“I keep telling Ma he’s not behind the trouble that keeps happening on the ranch. It’s just his cowhands fooling around, but she won’t listen.”
If it had been just the incident with Andy, Amanda might have agreed, but there was much more. Carruthers was growing increasingly insistent in his efforts to buy the Lazy T.
Corby took out his pocket watch and looked at it. “I can’t stay away from the saloon any longer. I’ll be back, but I can’t wait forever. A man like me deserves to have children.”
Corby was a vain peacock who was fortunate to have had her father as a partner when he wanted to open a saloon and a diner. Both establishments were on solid footing now, but her father had taught Corby how to attract and hold customers, how to handle the business end. Corby had been a good student and had become a decent businessman, but he would never be the man she wanted to marry.
“Is he gone?” her mother asked when she returned to the dining room.
“He’s leaving.”
Her mother sighed. “Your father admired his business ability, but I simply can’t feel comfortable with him.”
“You don’t have to. Now I need to clean up. I want to run into town this afternoon.”
“What for?” her mother asked.
“To put an end to this question of debt. I’ll be very curious to know what Mr. Kincaid will do then.”
“I really should be talking to your mother rather than you,” the president of the bank said to Amanda. “It’s not that I don’t trust you or don’t think you’re capable of understanding financial matters. It’s just that your mother is the senior member of the family.”
The bank was the most substantial building in Cactus Bend, but her mother had characterized it as a general store with an ugly grille and badly scarred woodwork.
“I understand, but my mother has always left financial matters to my father or me.”
Amanda felt uncomfortable facing the bank president. Roger Evans was one of those men who appreciated women—Amanda wished he wouldn’t look at her quite like she was a tasty morsel to be consumed—but felt they ought to stay at home where they belonged.
“What exactly is it that you want to know? I explained everything about the provisions of the will last year.” Dressed in black, Evans regarded her with an equally dark expression.
“It’s not about the will.” She hesitated, hating to involve an outsider in family business. “Before he died, my father sold his interest in the saloon and the diner.”
“Is there some question about that?”
“I don’t know how he paid for our ranch or for the bull. He said he had no debts, but I don’t have any contracts to show what his arrangements were.”
“Have you looked through his papers?”
“Yes.” Apparently Evans thought she was an idiot.
“Have you talked to his lawyer?”
“My father distrusted lawyers. He insisted that two honest men could handle any business arrangement between themselves.”
“Unfortunately that’s not always true. What are you concerned about?” Evans leaned back, complacent in his position of power.
“A man came to the house yesterday saying we owe seven hundred dollars to a woman in Crystal Springs. I think it’s for the bull my father bought. He says if we don’t pay the debt, a judge will be here in two weeks to hold an auction of our possessions so that the debt can be satisfied.”
The banker lost his appearance of disapproval and boredom and sat forward in his chair. “You didn’t give him any money, did you?”
“No. He advised us to go to Crystal Springs and look into the matter ourselves.”
The banker settled back in his chair. “That’s what a reputable lawyer would advise.”
“He’s not a lawyer. He’s a cowhand. He said the judge offered to commute his jail sentence if he could collect the debt.”
“That doesn’t sound like something a reputable judge would do.”
Amanda didn’t know how she was to determine who was reputable and who wasn’t. Her father had said the war had changed everyone. He had been particularly critical of the Reconstruction government and its appointments to the courts. Near universal use of the “ironclad” oath had deprived virtually every Texan of elected or appointed office.
“You have the only bank in town, so you must have handled my father’s business.”
“He deposited very little money with me.” Evans sounded resentful.
Her father had kept large amounts of cash in his safe because he preferred cash dealings in everything he did. “I didn’t come to ask about his deposits. I came to ask about the arrangements for paying for the ranch and the bull.”
“Your father didn’t handle either of those transactions through me. I’m familiar with his purchase of the ranch only because the previous owner deposited the funds with me before he moved away.”
“You know nothing about the purchase of the bull?”
“The first I heard about it came from your neighbor, Ian Sandoval.”
Amanda found it hard to believe her father could have handled such a transaction without anyone knowing.
“You should talk to Corby. Being your father’s partner, he might know something I don’t.”
She should have asked Corby when he was at the house earlier today, but she’d been too anxious to make him understand she was never going to marry him. She’d try to talk to him tonight, but he believed women were incapable of understanding anything about business.
“If this was a cash transaction, you might never find any record of the purchase,” the banker told her. “If Corby can’t help you, I think your best alternative is to go to Crystal Springs and talk to the person who says you owe the money. If this woman doesn’t have a written agreement, the dispute could end up in court unless you can come to a settlement between you.”
Amanda’s spirits sank. Instead of providing her with proof the debt had been paid, the banker had left her with the prospect of having to make a settlement or end up in court. She was certain her mother would rather pay money she didn’t owe than go to court. It was her oft-stated opinion that only criminals and the lower classes found themselves in courts with all their private business being aired in public.
“Thank you for your time,” Amanda said as she got to her feet. “If you should learn anything about this business, I’d appreciate your letting me know.”
“I will,” the bank president said as he stood. “These are difficult times. It’s necessary for all Texans to stick together.”
Amanda didn’t see how sticking together would help. What she needed were answers to a lot of questions. Why hadn’t the person who was owed the money contacted the Liscombs before now? How could she prove the debt had been paid? If her father had paid for the bull, someone should have received the money. Where was it?
Almost as important, why couldn’t she get Broc Kincaid out of her mind?
Broc approached the bunkhouse from the opposite direction of the house. He wanted to make sure neither Amanda nor her mother saw him. He was hoping Eddie was either inside or away from the house. He had to take his chance that Leo and Gary were out working on the ranch, leaving only Andy in the bunkhouse.
When Love Comes Page 7