The Texan's Reward

by Jodi Thomas

  The whimpering came again. Jacob moved to the far corner of the cave and pushed a box aside with his foot.

  He found a thin border collie curled in a ball. The animal was too near dead to do more than whimper as Jacob wrapped a dusty rag he found around him and carried the dog out.

  Once he was back to the dugout, Jacob made camp out by the well. There was no shortage of boards to use for a fire. Soon, Jacob had it blazing. He took care of his horse and set the food he’d brought on the well, hoping to keep it away from some of the critters nearby. Marla had packed several pieces of chicken along with bread and coffee.

  Jacob put on the coffee to boil and eased down a few feet from the dog.

  The animal had been watching his every move, and snarled like he might bite if Jacob made any advances.

  “Easy now, old fellow.” Jacob kept his voice low. “I didn’t lug you out of that cave to kill you now.”

  Jacob didn’t hurry; he gave the dog time. He had no idea what was wrong with the animal, but since the collie was or had been bleeding, Jacob figured it had to be an accident of some kind.

  He moved a bite of chicken within the dog’s reach.

  The animal snapped it up.

  Jacob placed another piece an inch closer.

  The animal ate again.

  The fourth time the dog took the bite of meat from the ranger’s hand. “That a way to go, boy,” Jacob said low and slow. “Might as well come to dinner.”

  By the time the chicken was gone, the dog let Jacob touch him. It took a few tries, for blood seemed to be everywhere, but Jacob finally figured out what was wrong.

  The dog had been shot. Once in the leg, once in the neck. Both bullets had passed though, leaving both an entrance and exit wound. No bones were broken, but the neck wound still bled.

  Jacob pulled some of the ointment from his pack that Mrs. O’Daniel had insisted he take to put on his knife wounds. “If this didn’t kill me, it won’t kill you.”

  By the light of the fire, Jacob smeared the salve on and bandaged the dog as best he could. Then Jacob drank his coffee and leaned back against his saddle. He fell asleep with the dog resting his chin on his leg.

  At dawn, the fire had disappeared, but the dog was still there. His eyes were no longer wild as his gaze followed Jacob’s movements.

  “How about I see what we have for breakfast?” Jacob asked as he rummaged through the supplies. “Rolls for me and looks like a scrambled egg sandwich for you.” He held out the sandwich, and the dog took it, bread and all. “Lucky thing you like it. I hate eggs, but I didn’t have the heart to tell Marla.”

  He split the rest of his breakfast with the dog and poured water in his hand so the animal could drink. “I think I’ll call you Fred. I never had a friend named Fred, and it always struck me as a good name.”

  The collie looked more sleepy than interested.

  Jacob fed his horse, then began exploring the place again. With his skills in tracking, he could sometimes read what happened at a place the way other people read the paper.

  There were boot prints of a man who walked mostly on his heels and rocked when he paused. Three shells were a few feet outside the hole where animals had come and gone from the dugout, which told Jacob whoever shot Fred had been standing less that five feet away. The dog must have run for the shelter and hid there until the heel-walker was gone.

  Jacob knew Harrison and Farrow had both been to the land in the past week. One of them had shot the dog. Maybe out of fear. Maybe to keep him quiet.

  “Well, whoever it was, Fred . . .” Jacob glanced back at the dog still lying by the fire. “He was a bad shot. Three shells. He was so close I don’t see how he missed you completely once.”

  The ranger remembered Harrison saying he didn’t much like guns. Which translated that he would probably be a bad shot. On the other hand, Farrow didn’t strike him as being good at much of anything but talking.

  Jacob continued his search. There were several places where someone had tried to get into the house, pulling a board or two loose. The bookkeeper wasn’t strong enough to carry Nell, so he might not have the strength to pull the board free. Walter Farrow seemed to have spent his time lifting only a fork.

  Jacob didn’t like the idea of even considering Harrison in the same category as Farrow. If Harrison had shot the dog, he would have mentioned it when he made it back home. Nell wouldn’t have liked it, but she’d understand.

  He moved into the shack and began to search for anything that might make this old place valuable. Trash was everywhere. Stockard seemed to have the idea that stuff was easier to step over than burn. What few pots he had were scattered about. Plates were piled in a bucket along with a few forks. Old newspapers and letters were stuffed into cracks to keep out the wind.

  Jacob picked up each piece of furniture, looking for something, anything that might be of interest. Maybe a key, or a map, or even money tucked away where no one would notice.

  Fred limped in and watched Jacob for a while, then limped out again. The dog looked near death last night, but this morning it seemed like he might just make it.

  Jacob pulled the newspapers out of the cracks in the wall. Most were from five or more years ago. A few crumbled in his fingers as he tried to unfold them. He found a couple of letters and envelopes. One had a return address of a prison down near Houston.

  Jacob took the prison letter outside, but when he opened it, all he found was a blank piece of paper. Turning it over in his fingers, Jacob wondered if it had once borne ink marks but the rain and weather had soaked it too many times.

  Jacob tossed the letters in the campfire. He searched for another hour but found nothing of value. Harrison’s assessment had been accurate about the ranch. Whatever Farrow saw in the place was beyond Jacob.

  Grabbing the last pile of letters, he moved to the fire. Just before he tossed them in, Jacob spotted one envelope with the return address still readable.

  Zeb Whitaker.

  Jacob’s hand shook slightly as if he’d heard the voice of a dead man calling him. Zeb Whitaker had been the old buffalo hunter who’d claimed Nell’s friends stole his saddlebags of gold. He’d been the man who ambushed Nell.

  The ranger forced a smile. Zeb Whitaker was dead, had been for months. Even if this was his letter, he was beyond hurting anyone.

  Jacob opened the envelope. Empty. He checked another. Nothing. Old Stockard had saved the envelopes to use for stuffing, but he must have burned the letters. Not that Jacob cared. Stockard and Zeb were both dead, and the letters had been written years ago.

  He tossed the mail into the fire. Nell didn’t need to be reminded of Whitaker or that he and Stockard even knew each other.

  Climbing up by the cave, Jacob sat watching for a while, but saw nothing move but a few rabbits. By midafternoon, he knew he had to ride down to the bend in the river and see if Harrison had learned anything. If possible, he planned to talk to the bookkeeper while Nell was in the water.

  If he and Harrison both agreed the place was worthless, maybe Nell would sell it. Jacob didn’t know how to put it into words to Nell, but the place had a bad feeling about it. She’d be better off letting Walter Farrow have his uncle’s place.

  By the time the ranger reached the bend of the river, Nell and the nurse were already shoulder deep in the water. Jacob found Harrison standing on the far side of the wagon, watching the road from town.

  “Afternoon,” Jacob said.

  From Harrison’s smile, he guessed Nell hadn’t told anyone how she got hurt. Otherwise, all her little army would hate him, too.

  “How is it out at the Stockard place?” Harrison shoved his hat back.

  “Lonely,” Jacob answered.

  “I figured that.” Rand reached for the basket of food Marla had sent. “Marla said if you’ll bring this back tomorrow, she’ll keep you supplied.”

  “Beats jerky and beans.” Jacob thanked him. “Any news?”

  Harrison shook his head. “Got a telegram f
rom the doctor who comes in to check on Nell. He said he’d be here in two or three days. Other than that, nothing.”

  Jacob leaned on the wagon guard. “Did you see a dog while you were out at the dugout?”

  Rand shook his head. “Did you find one?”

  Jacob nodded. “He was still alive, but he’d been shot.”

  They talked about all the possibilities for a while, then Mrs. O’Daniel yelled.

  “I’ll stand watch if you want to carry Nell out,” Harrison offered. “It’ll give you a chance to say hello.”

  Jacob hesitated, but he couldn’t very well say no without everyone wondering why. Maybe Nell would let him carry her back to the wagon without screaming for him to never touch her again.

  He tugged his boots and guns off and waded in. Mrs. O’Daniel greeted him warmly, but Nell didn’t meet his gaze as he moved beside her and gently lifted her out of the water. It was a little late to say he was sorry, and Jacob hated having an audience to talk to Nell. But if he didn’t say something, Harrison was bound to notice things weren’t right between them.

  “How’s Hank?” Jacob asked, figuring it would be a safe subject.

  “I think he’s going to be all right,” Nell answered. She trailed her hand in the water, making a tiny wave.

  “How do you know?”

  Mrs. O’Daniel seemed to feel the question was directed toward her. “I opened the door to the attic room this morning, and Wednesday was sitting beside his bed feeding her baby. The boy’s eyes were open, and he was watching as if he were seeing the eighth wonder of the world.” Mrs. O’Daniel hurried ahead of them now that they were in shallow water, but she raised her voice to make sure Jacob heard her story. “Wednesday looked up at Hank and smiled as though feeding her baby in front of him were the most natural thing in the world. And he smiled back like a boy does when he knows it’s not long before he’ll be a man and understand such things.”

  Jacob frowned, having no idea what the nurse was talking about. Maybe he’d yet to smile that smile. He looked at Harrison, but the bookkeeper showed no sign of understanding either.

  “He knows he’s not to leave the attic?” Jacob asked.

  “He knows,” Nell answered, but she didn’t look up at him.

  Nell gripped the seat as Jacob lifted her onto the wagon.

  “An hour later,” Mrs. O’Daniel continued as she climbed into the other side of the bench and wrapped Nell in a blanket, “Hank ate every last bit of his breakfast.”

  Jacob glanced up at Nell and smiled, but she wasn’t looking in his direction. “Are you all right?” He couldn’t stand her ignoring him much longer.

  “I’m fine,” she answered too quickly. “Marla said to tell you she’ll leave the back door open if you want to go up the back stairs to the attic and check on Hank some night. That way you won’t have to wake anyone in the house.”

  Jacob nodded, hearing every word she didn’t say. He wasn’t invited to visit her room.

  He wanted to touch her hand when he said good-bye, but Nell had already pulled it beneath the covers.

  “We’d better hurry back before she gets cold.” Mrs. O’Daniel waved at him.

  “See you tomorrow,” Harrison said as he took the reins.

  A few minutes later, Jacob was alone again. He rode back to his camp by the dugout and wished he were a hundred miles away in the middle of a range war.

  After dark, he fed most of his supper to the dog and leaned back to watch the stars. He wondered if Nell was sitting by her window looking at the same sky and thinking of him.

  Around midnight, he heard someone singing. Fred heard it, too, for the dog’s ears shot up, and he growled.

  Jacob reached for his rifle and moved beyond the fire’s light. He listened as the voice grew nearer. Gospel songs, he thought and put the rifle back in its place beside the saddle.

  A few minutes later, Brother Aaron showed up in his old buggy. He climbed down and handed Jacob a half-empty bottle of whiskey. “I thought I’d report in.” He tried to salute. “And, since I was coming, I brought some of the devil’s milk with me in case you were sleeping out in the cold. I hate the stuff myself, but I did test it to see that it was of some worth.”

  “Thanks.” Jacob was too lonely to scold the man. “Join me by the fire.”

  They talked about the dog for a while, and Brother Aaron introduced himself to Fred as if the animal would answer back. The old man sat on one of the stools from the house and told Jacob all about what he’d learned in town.

  “It seems that Walter Farrow got real friendly with the head of the posse, a man named Kelly. Everyone thought the sheriff in Fort Worth had sent them out, but turns out they were hired by the railroad.”

  Jacob wasn’t surprised. He’d heard of that happening plenty of times. What surprised him was how fast the men must have hit the trail. They must have been loading their horses into railroad cars and leaving for the scene of the robbery within an hour after the news reached Fort Worth.

  “One of Parker’s deputies told me they weren’t nothing but a bunch of hired guns. He said he heard one say he’d take any job as long as there was money involved.” Brother Aaron coughed and asked if he might have a swallow from the bottle for medicinal purposes.

  It must have worked, because he didn’t cough again, and he kept the bottle.

  Jacob enjoyed the company. When the reverend wasn’t preaching, he could tell stories with the best of them. He also had a knack of summing up a man with only a few words. Jacob admired that about him.

  “I don’t trust that Farrow,” he said after a short silence. “If he’s such a high and mighty lawyer back in Dallas, why is he living in that tiny little house everyone said Stockard used to own in town? Some folks claim Stockard lost it in a poker game one night to an old drinking buddy who let him keep staying there. If that was true, the man died before filing the debt with the county. Since the house wasn’t in Stockard’s will but was still in his name, the sheriff says he guesses it goes to next of kin.”

  Jacob found the news interesting. Apparently, Farrow planned to settle down in town.

  The preacher wandered off to have a talk with nature. When he returned, he held out a coin. “I saw this sparkling in the moonlight over by the well.”

  Jacob turned the coin over in his fingers and rubbed some of the dirt off. “It’s a twenty dollar gold piece.”

  Brother Aaron moved closer. “You think it’s part of that old buffalo hunter’s stash that disappeared several years back?”

  Jacob shook his head. Everyone in the state had heard the tale of Zeb Whitaker and his saddlebags of gold. He believed until the day he died that three young women robbed him of the treasure, and he almost killed them and Nell trying to get one of them to admit it. “I think more than likely, it fell out of old Stockard’s pocket when he was too drunk to notice. Just because Whitaker and Stockard were friends doesn’t mean the gold is around here. If it were, don’t you think Stockard would have bettered himself with the money and not died begging food off Fat Alice?”

  “Maybe. Maybe not. Who died first, Stockard or Whitaker?”

  “Stockard’s been dead a couple of years at least, I don’t remember. But Whitaker died right after Nell was hurt last summer.”

  Brother Aaron scratched his beard. “Maybe Stockard was too afraid to touch Whitaker’s gold. Maybe he thought his friend would get out of prison and come after him.”

  Jacob shook his head. “Whitaker couldn’t have put the gold here. He died not knowing where it was.”

  The preacher laughed. “Maybe only Stockard knew.”

  Jacob shrugged. “Maybe so. Someone had to have picked up the saddlebags the night Whitaker was knocked out. But, if it had been Stockard, the money had never done him any good.”

  The preacher looked over at the well. “You think Nell would mind if I rode back out here in the morning and took a look in that well?”

  Jacob shook his head. “Right now I have no idea what she’s t
hinking. You’ll have to ask her.”

  Brother Aaron climbed in his buggy. “Until tomorrow,” he yelled as he pulled away.

  CHAPTER 34

  JACOB MADE UP HIS MIND THE NEXT MORNING THAT he would have to talk to Nell, and he needed to do it alone.

  When the preacher hadn’t shown up by noon, he began to worry. What if something had happened to the old man on the way back home? Or what if there was trouble at Nell’s? Several things could have happened. She could have fallen again. Hank might have been discovered. Walter Farrow could have even gone nuts and showed up at the ranch with a gun. Jacob already figured the man to be about four hundred pounds of crazy. He didn’t seem the type of man who understood the word no.

  Jacob rode to the river and waited. He told himself he’d done so in case they came early, but he knew that he simply could not stay put any longer.

  He walked the banks of the river and found a place where the water circled around lazily in a small cove. There, the river looked as clear as glass and probably measured about five feet deep.

  When Nell and Harrison pulled up, Marla was with them and not the nurse.

  “What’s wrong?” Jacob asked even before the bookkeeper touched ground.

  Harrison frowned. “It seems Brother Aaron had another wrestle with the devil in the dark last night. He claims the devil shoved him off the porch, but it looks like he may have simply fallen. We found him out cold in the flower bed this morning.”

  “Is he all right?”

  Harrison nodded. “The preacher swears the devil stole a coin out of his pocket. He also says his leg is messed up, but he won’t let Mrs. O’Daniel look at it. Plans to wait until Nell’s doctor comes in from Cedar Point tomorrow. They were arguing when we left.”

  “So no swim?”