Forever, Victoria

by Dorothy Garlock

  Guiding the team across the back track toward the outbuildings, Sage thought about Ruby. The first time he had come to the Double M she had sat and talked with him, asking no questions, telling him about herself and Stonewall and about how she came to be at the ranch. After that she was always glad to see him, pleased when he whittled ’most any little old thing for her. The owl—why, it wasn’t even very good. And the goose—she kept it wrapped carefully and put away in her trunk, and its neck was too long for its body.

  Sage was so lost in his thoughts he didn’t realize it was raining until he saw the water drip from his hat. He pulled the team to a halt beside the open shed that held the forge. Old Hitch came ambling out of the tack room.

  “Looks like hit’s gonna rain.”

  Sage grinned. “Seems like it’s doin’ it.”

  “Got wheel trouble? I did some blacksmithin’. Maybe I kin give ya a hand.”

  “Glad to have your help. How’s Stonewall?”

  “Fair to middlin’,” Hitch said and started building the forge fire with Pittsburgh coal.

  The bellows leaked and the iron they were using as an anvil was badly chipped, but Sage worked around these handicaps and set a section of iron into the wheel. With the help of Hitch he heated the rim and laid in the splice, then wrapped a wet gunny sack around it and heated the other end of the inset. Sage scrubbed his work in the dirt so he could see what kind of joining he had made. It was good. It would have been neater with better tools, but it was good. He heaved the wheel into the wagon bed and peered out at the steady downpour.

  “Ya ain’t goin’ back tonight, are ya, Sage?” Old Hitch had unharnessed the team and led the grateful mules to the feedbox.

  “I was thinkin’ on it, but I guess there’s no need.”

  The wind driving the rain had a bite to it. In another few weeks that rain would be snow. Sage was glad to have the excuse to sleep on the cot in the bunkhouse instead of in the bedroll under the wagon. He dipped up a bucket of water from the oak barrel, carefully replaced the lid, and then went to the bunkhouse where he stripped off his clothes, bathed, and shaved the more than three days’ growth of whiskers from his face. He discarded his dirty shirt and dug into his pack for another. The shirt he slipped on was dark red with pearl buttons. He tucked it neatly into his pants and buckled on his gunbelt.

  It was strange, but good, to have the bunkhouse to himself. All the hands with the exception of old Hitch, Pete and Clay were down the valley. Even young Doonie was working as sidekick to Gopher. Sage had been impressed with the Mahaffey men. He liked them, they knew how to work. Mason had taken the reins from Stonewall’s hands without a flicker of discontent among the men. He worked alongside the men and they liked and respected him. The twins had balked at first at having to stay at the ranch for a few days, but Mason was firm. At no time was the homestead to be left with only the women, Stonewall, and old Hitch.

  Sage stood in the doorway of the bunkhouse and looked toward the main house. There was a light shining from the kitchen window. He wondered if Nellie was cooking the evening meal. A pang of loneliness came over him as he looked at the lighted window. What would it be like to come home to your own house, see the light and know that there was someone cooking just for you? And when the meal was over and the kitchen put to right you would sit beside the fire and she would tell you about the happenings of the day? And afterward, during the long night, you would hold your woman, warm and soft, in your arms and the two of you would whisper to each other and laugh and kiss and…love.…

  Sage grabbed his slicker from the peg beside the door, draped it over his head and ran out into the rain. He jumped over a puddle of water forming in front of Ruby’s cabin and went up onto the porch. He was shaking the rain from the slicker when Ruby opened the door.

  “It’s ’bout time ya got yoreself over here. Stonewall saw ya come in ’n’ I put on extra for supper.”

  Sage grinned down at her. “And ah can smell it.” He reached out and tweaked the ribbon she had tucked into the knot of faded, red hair on the top of her head. “Not only can she cook up a good mess, she’s pretty, too!”

  “Ain’t I tol’ ya to keep yore hands off my woman, boy?” Stonewall spoke up from the big chair.

  Ruby tilted her head saucily, her eyes danced merrily, her round face wreathed in smiles. This game was repeated almost every time Sage came to the cabin.

  “Stonewall Perry, ya just hush up,” she said with mock irritation. “Ya didn’t say nothin’ ’bout my ribbon, ya never even let on ya seed it!”

  “I did so!”

  “Wal, ya didn’t say nothin’. Come on ’n’ sit, Sage. Talk to this here man of mine. He’s been ornery as a cow a standin’ on her tit since he was laid up.”

  “Ain’t never done so much sittin’ in all my born days,” Stonewall grumbled.

  Sage sat down, carefully keeping his eyes averted from Stonewall’s discolored face. His cleanly shaven cheeks were caved in and his eyes were darkly shadowed beneath his shaggy brows. The skin under his chin and on his forearms sagged with his sudden loss of weight. The old anger and desire for revenge bubbled up in Sage and he had to force it down when he spoke.

  “We’ll be ready to make the drive inside of a week. Must have twenty thousand head in the lower valley. Got to get a goin’ with them, the grass is about gone.”

  “That many, huh?” Stonewall got out the makings for a cigarette, built a smoke, then handed the tobacco and papers across to Sage. “Mason sent anybody in to give the stockman a count?”

  “Sent Lud, just like ya told him.”

  Stonewall grunted his approval.

  Ruby fussed with the supper, her eyes often going to her husband. Seeing the man she loved sitting in a chair, too weak to get out of it alone, was the hardest thing she had ever had to bear. When they’d brought him in, bloody and broken, all she had cared about was keeping him alive. But now a deep and abiding hatred for his attacker burned deeply and she had promised herself revenge.

  Sage helped Ruby move the table over to Stonewall’s chair and they ate the meal of fried beef, gravy and hot biscuits. Sage sopped up the last of the gravy with his bread, leaned back, and smiled at Ruby.

  “I swear, if you wasn’t took, I’d come a courtin’.”

  “Well, I’m took, Sage Harrington, but there’s others round here what ain’t.”

  “Now, honeybunch,” Stonewall scolded affectionately. “You just hold up on yore matchmaking. Ever’ time Nellie comes round, Sage, she’s a singin’ yore praises. She’s tryin’ to make that gal think you get up ever’ mornin’ ’n’ hang out the sun.”

  Ruby looked flustered. “I ain’t done no such thing, Stonewall Perry. Now, it was this-away, Sage, I just said that—”

  There was a light tap on the door before it opened. Nellie, with a piece of slicker cloth draped over her head and a small covered crock in her arm, stood hesitantly in the doorway. She had no way of knowing how untimely her entrance was, and she felt a twinge of uneasiness when the three of them looked so surprised. Did they guess that she had seen Sage drive in, watched him dash to the cabin from the bunkhouse? For an instant she regretted her hasty decision to find an excuse to come here. Then, never at a loss for very long, Ruby was beside her.

  “Now, ain’t this nice? We got us two visitors come callin’, Stonewall. Land sakes, most times we don’t have nobody and here we got a houseful. What ya got there, Nellie? Here, let me take that slicker.”

  Nellie was grateful for Ruby’s chatter. Her eyes had met Sage’s when she first came in, but now she kept them away from him.

  “I brought you a fresh churnin’ of butter.” Nellie held out the crock.

  “Now ain’t that nice, Stonewall?” Ruby took the crock from Nellie’s hands. “Ain’t nothin’ Stonewall likes more’n fresh churned butter. This’ll come in right handy.” Ruby deftly flipped a cloth over the nearly full crock of butter on the table and tried to hide her smile. “This’ll be plumb good with biscuits ’n
’ honey, won’t it, Sage?”

  “I reckon it will.”

  Nellie heard the words through the pounding of her heart in her ears. Oh, she wished she hadn’t come! She couldn’t think of a single thing to say. She wanted to look at Sage, but she didn’t dare. She kept her eyes on Ruby.

  “Well…I’ve got to be getting back.”

  “Ya just got here! Ain’t no call for ya to be goin’ a’ready. Sage, let Nellie set thar and you ’n’ me’ll sit on this here bench.” Ruby pulled a bench from beneath the table and Sage got to his feet.

  “No, no,” Nellie protested, her face scarlet. “I’ve got to get back.” She grabbed the slicker cloth from the hook where Ruby had hung it. It was cold and wet, but she didn’t notice. She just knew she had made a fool of herself and she wanted to get out from under the scrutiny of those deep blue eyes. She reached for the door, and suddenly Sage was beside her reaching for his own slicker.

  “I’ll walk with ya back to the house.”

  “That’s a right good idee, Sage,” Ruby said from beside Stonewall’s chair. “Are ya warm enough, Nellie, in that li’l old shawl?”

  “Yes, I’m fine. You…don’t need to go with me.” She looked up at Sage. He was wreaking havoc with her senses, not to mention her heartbeat.

  “I want to, ma’am.”

  “Course he does,” Ruby said. “Sage don’t want you a runnin’ round out there in the dark; ya might, uh, ya might…”

  “Hush, honeybunch. He’s goin’. Ya don’t have to say no more.” Stonewall chuckled.

  “I’ll swear, Stonewall Perry, yore the beatinest man I ever saw! Ya just open your mouth and put yore foot clear inside of it,” Ruby sputtered.

  “Thanks for the supper, Ruby. I’ll stop back and see if there’s any word you want to send out to Mason, Stonewall. I ’spect I’ll head out early.” Sage opened the door. Nellie went out onto the porch and just caught Stonewall’s chuckle again and Ruby call out to Sage.

  “Ain’t no hurry, Sage. We won’t be a goin’ to bed for a spell.”.

  CHAPTER

  * 12 *

  The door closed and Nellie began to tremble violently. Paralysis gripped her throat, preventing her from speaking. The rain was sliding off the eaves in a solid sheet. A flash of lightning revealed low, massive thunderheads above the mesa’s black rim. She pulled the slicker cloth up over her head.

  “Don’t go yet.” Sage spoke quietly.

  She stood silently, wanting to say something, wanting to break down the wall between them, to let him know that she wanted to stay and talk with him. She had talked with few men other than her brothers, and none that made her as tongue-tied as this man.

  “I shouldn’t be talkin’ to ya,” he said gloomily. “I’m no kind of a man to be talking to a girl like you.”

  “Then, why are you?” She felt a spurt of anger, more at herself for coming out here in the first place, than at him. “Why shouldn’t you talk to me? I’m grown up!”

  “I’m not a staying kind of man. I’m just a lone coyote who walks on two legs instead of four. Some folks say I’m a no-good saddle tramp.” His words were mocking, yet Nellie knew the words hid a deep well of loneliness and bitterness.

  They stood facing each other, only a few feet apart, and on the roof above them the rain fell with a pleasant, soothing sound. The thunder had retreated into the canyons where it groaned and grumbled.

  She shivered.

  “Yore cold. Do ya want to go back in the cabin and wait until the rain slacks a bit?”

  “Do you?” she whispered with a sinking feeling.

  To her surprise, he chuckled. “My word, ma’am! Why’d I want to do that? I was a sittin’ in there wonderin’ how I was goin’ to get to see ya ’n’ ya popped right in the door.”

  A faint laugh bubbled from her throat, venting her tension. “Ruby might throw us back out in the rain.”

  He laughed. It wasn’t a chuckle this time, but a real laugh. “Long as Ruby’s gone to such trouble to get us together we might as well sit awhile. There’s a plank over here.” He took her arm and they moved to the end of the porch.

  Nellie’s heart released a flood of happiness that was reflected in her laugh. She sat down and Sage stepped across to sit beside her and shield her from the rain that dripped from the eave.

  “You’ll get wet,” she cautioned.

  “Not if I cover up with this slicker.” He draped the cloth across their laps and pulled it up over his shoulder. The feel of this small, trusting girl sitting close beside him was like no other feeling he’d ever had. Nellie, Nellie! It was hard for him to believe he was sitting here in the dark with her. She was so close he could feel her soft thigh against his. He felt a tremor go through her and his arm automatically moved to slide behind her and draw her into the hollow beneath his arm. “Are you cold, Nellie?”

  A quiver of pure pleasure went through her at the way he spoke her name. She had never felt so wildly excited in her life. It wasn’t from the cold that she trembled.

  “I’m not cold,” she whispered. “Sage?” She turned her face up to his, but it was so dark she couldn’t see his eyes. She could feel his breath on her face and smell its faint tobacco smell. “Will you think I’m silly if I say I’m shaking because I’m so…excited?”

  “No more than me.” His voice was low and soft, and she felt the vibrations when he laughed. She wished she had the courage to put her hand on his chest. He was whiplash thin and the thigh pressed to hers was rock hard. Being close to him was causing her heart to thunder and little shivers to run down her back.

  “I’ve never sat with a man like this.” She giggled like a little girl and brought her hand out from beneath the slicker to push her hair back from her eyes. “Have you? With a girl, I mean.”

  “No. But I think I’d like to do it ever’ time it rains…with you.” The arm around her tightened and she leaned against its strength. “I was tryin’ to figure out if I was going to get to see ya. I was sure hopin’ I would.”

  Nellie gave a soft, trilling laugh and his hand caught hers under the slicker. “Why do you think I came to Ruby’s? I could’ve died when I saw she had a full crock of butter on the table!”

  “Naw! I didn’t notice the butter, all I was seein’ was a purty little dark-haired gal a standin’ in the door.” The loneliness had dropped from his shoulders and Sage felt lighthearted and young for the first time in many years.

  “I was so nervous, Sage. I thought everybody’d know I made up an excuse to come see you. Oh, do you think I’m shameful for saying I came to see you?” She giggled and turned her face to his chest.

  “I don’t think yore shameful at all. I’m plumb tickled to hear you say it.” His head bent low until it was almost resting on hers. “Nellie, girl, since that first day I’ve not been able to get ya out of my mind. And before I let ya go I’m going to have to kiss ya. Will ya let me?” He swallowed, fighting the tightness in his throat. Never had he wanted anything as much as he wanted to hold and protect this wondrous, fairylike girl. He wanted to grab her up and carry her away where there would be just the two of them. He’d work, he’d slave, sweat, fight to keep her safe. You fool! he groaned inwardly. She hasn’t said anything. You’ve jumped the gun and she’s shying away.

  “I’ve not kissed a man before. I might not know how.” Her voice shook with her uncertainty.

  He laughed in relief and his hand burrowed beneath the shawl and curved around her rib cage. “There’s nothing to it.”