Forsythe glanced at the men standing along the porch. A few were smiling; a few were trying not to. To be made a fool of by this smart-mouthed fly-by-night was more humiliation than he could endure.
“Who are you?”
“A man, Colonel, suh. A man who doesn’t hit women, kill old men or cheat poor homesteaders out of their land.” Dillon had more to say. “Do ya know what ya are, Colonel, suh? You’re a low-caliber crook and nothin’ more!”
Forsythe’s fury burst forth in a strangled shout.
“Stay away from me, you stupid son of a bitch, or you’ll end up in an alley with a bullet in the head.”
In a lightning move, Cleve grabbed Dillon’s arm before he could draw his gun.
“Wait,” he said urgently. “Wait—”
At that moment, Cleve was one of only two men in the world who could keep Dillon from killing Forsythe for those words. The other man who had that power was John Tallman. Cleve prodded the angry man until their backs were to the building. They watched Forsythe and Lee hurry across the street and go up the stairs to the land office.
“Reckon I’ve tore it?” Dillon asked, his voice choked.
“Naw. Might be for the best. Get a man mad and he makes a mistake. He’ll not send his pack against us while we’re in town. Too many people heard the threat. There’s more men here against him than for him. You caused a few grins.”
“Gawd, I hate that son of a bitch! Sometimes I think the hate is eating me up.”
* * *
In the office above the bank, Forsythe flung his hat down on the desk and paced the floor.
“That sonofabitching kid wanted to kill me! What the hell have I ever done to him?”
“It could be that one of his relatives was Ellington, Spencer, Gottworth, Johnson or any of the homesteaders we’ve forced off the land.”
Mark Lee’s uneasiness about his association with Forsythe had escalated steadily since the killing of old Cletus Fuller. Forsythe ordered a killing as casually as he ordered a meal at the restaurant. Lee had no doubt that if the land deal blew up, Forsythe would throw the blame on him and come out of it with a little scandal attached to his name, but nothing that would prevent him from starting up another scheme in a few years.
“What the hell did he mean—hitting women?” Forsythe blurted as if suddenly remembering Dillon’s words. “If Ruth has been shooting off her mouth, I’ll break her damn neck. I’ll tell you another thing”—he was working himself into a full-blown rage. The face he shoved close to Lee’s was fiery red. —“I’ll have another job for Del Gomer when he gets back. Nobody, and I mean nobody, talks to me like that and gets away with it. Damn kid’ll not think he’s so smart with a bullet between his eyes.”
Chapter Twenty
“Oh, look, it’s suckin’.”
Bonnie stroked the head of the tired cow, who had been too exhausted to get up after giving birth to the calf at daybreak. Gustaf and Bonnie had prodded and coaxed until finally the cow had stood on shaky legs to munch on the fresh-cut grass Bonnie offered.
“Gustaf says we can wean her in a week or two. It will be nice to have milk again.” Kristin gave the cow an affectionate pat on the rump. “I’m going in, Bonnie, and start a batch of bread.”
Kristin couldn’t work up much enthusiasm for the new calf. Her thoughts were constantly on the widening gulf between herself and Buck. Three days had passed since Bernie and Bonnie had arrived, and Kristin had sunk deeper each day into her private misery. Buck came to breakfast and supper, which she prolonged, if possible, until she saw him ride into the yard. Each morning she wrapped biscuits and meat in a clean cloth for him to take for a noon meal.
This morning, after he had muttered his thanks without looking at her, her temper had flared.
“Why thank me? It’s your food. I didn’t pay out a penny for it.”
He had looked at her then. Kristin was too angry to notice that his eyes softened and briefly caressed her before he shook his head slowly and that closed-in look pulled all feeling from his face. When he spoke, even the tone of his voice closed her out.
“Your work here amounts to pay. I’m not wearing socks with lumps where I’ve tried to sew up the holes. You cook the meals and . . . this house hasn’t been this clean since the day it was built.” His glance fell away and he shoved his hat down on his head. “Don’t wait supper for me.”
“As you just indicated, my job is to cook. Your meal will be waiting . . . whenever you get here,” she said stiffly.
Her shoulders slumped as his footsteps crossed the porch. She felt as if she had been physically mauled. She had always been proud of her abiding strength, and now it was beginning to fail her. She sank down on a chair and planted her elbows on the table. Keeping the land her Uncle Yarby had left to her was no longer her all-consuming passion. Perhaps she and Gustaf should leave. They could go across country to Billings, the route he had taken to get here.
If I meant anything to Buck at all, he would come for me . . . sometime.
“Ya love him, don’t ya?” Bonnie stood in the kitchen door. Kristin had not even heard her cross the porch.
“What makes you say that?” She got to her feet and took a clean cloth from underneath the wash bench.
Bonnie laughed and came into the room. “Ya don’t look at each other or say anythin’ that amounts to much. Ya either love each other a powerful lot or hate each other a powerful lot. I ain’t thinkin’ it’s hate that’s makin’ ya sad.”
“That’s experience talking?” Kristin covered a pan of bread dough with a cloth and began to carry soiled dishes to the dishpan.
“I was in love once, or thought I was. It ain’t somethin’ a body can do anythin’ about.”
“A body can do what she has to do if she sets her mind to it. Let’s get the kitchen cleaned. What’re we going to name the new calf?”
“You name her. She’s yours.”
“She’s Buck’s. I named the cow Dolly Madison. She didn’t have a name when she got here.”
“Gustaf thought the name Andora would be fittin’ for the calf.”
It began as a nervous titter, then a nervous laugh, the first Bonnie had heard from Kristin since they arrived.
“Leave it to Gustaf.”
“What’s so funny about naming the calf Andora?”
“It’s my brother’s wife’s name. She’s very pretty and very useless.”
“You and Gustaf don’t like her?”
“Not much.”
Kristin washed the dishes; Bonnie dried them and put them away. The two women worked well together. Isolated in her brother’s house, Kristin had never had a woman friend like Bonnie. During the past three days they had talked about everything . . . except the strained relationship between her and Buck. It was too painful for Kristin to speak of it with her newfound friend.
Her pride in Buck’s accomplishments had been reflected in the way she had bragged about how well he had built this sturdy cabin and painstakingly crafted some of the furnishings. She told Bonnie how he had cared for her Uncle Yarby, who had been as helpless as a young child.
“I don’t know if Gustaf would have had the patience to care for Uncle Yarby like Buck did. Buck not only tended to him, but he also protected him from a posse that came here to hang him.”
Bonnie listened to Kristin’s warm praises of Buck Lenning and hoped the man was smart enough to realize that she was in love with him.
“Gustaf says that Tandy is a lot better.” Bonnie stood the broom in the corner after sweeping the room. “He and Bernie are takin’ turns standin’ guard. Mr. Lenning wants one man besides the Indian drover here at the house at all times.”
Kristin didn’t bother to tell Bonnie that this was something she had heard discussed at the dinner table. She sensed that Bonnie’s curiosity about Gustaf was the reason the girl had brought his name up so often the last few days.
While cleaning the lamp chimneys, Kristin talked about herself and Gustaf being born on the same d
ay a mile apart and growing up almost as twins. During their childhood he had been her closest friend and was to this day. Bonnie understood that. Their mother had died giving birth to her and Bernie. They had been raised by their father and grandmother. After both of them passed away, the twins had only each other.
In his early teens Bernie had been knocked down by a horse and his leg run over by a freight wagon. The bones were so badly crushed that the doctor had amputated it below the knee. Bernie had adjusted to the loss of his leg amazingly fast, and together he and Bonnie had worked at a stage station in northern Wyoming cooking meals and making beds. Bernie had taken care of feeding the stock and repairing the harnesses. The burly station owner had hooked up the lively teams to the stages. When the station closed, the twins had gone to Big Timber and put every penny they had saved over five years into the restaurant.
“I don’t know what we’ll do when we leave here, but we’ll get along. We always have.”
“When this is settled and I get title to my land, I’ll have to sell off a piece of it to get started. Gustaf will help me, and if I can afford it, I’ll give Bernie work. If not, maybe Buck will.”
“Bernie likes Mr. Lenning. He said that he doesn’t make him feel any less a man because he has only one leg.”
“I saw him leave this morning. That horse he was on was kind of . . . frisky.”
“Mr. Lenning fixed a stirrup for Bernie’s peg. My brother is happier than he’s been in a long time. He never really liked being in town.” Bonnie pulled on a worn coat of her brother’s. “I can smell fall in the air. Winter will be here before we know it. I’d better go see about Tandy. I’m afraid I’m getting fond of that old coot.”
“Why afraid?”
“Something usually happens to people I’m fond of. Our father and our granny died. Cletus was killed. Then my brother was beat so bad, I thought he’d die. And a man I could have loved turned out to be a hired killer.”
Kristin watched Bonnie cross the yard. As much as she enjoyed her company, she was grateful to have a few minutes alone. The thought that perhaps she and Gustaf should leave clung to her mind like a burr to a dog’s tail.
Buck’s attitude toward her had changed drastically since the day the Indian, Runs Fast, had caught her down by the creek. She was sure that he longed to have his home to himself again and be rid of the responsibility of watching over a houseful of tinhorns, as Gilly called them.
Tonight she would talk to Gustaf about it.
* * *
Three Indians rode out of the trees and toward the Sioux camp behind the ranch buildings. The women in the camp glanced at the horsemen and then went on with their work. Whatever the men wanted had nothing to do with them. One of the drovers, not much more than a boy, but one who took the responsibility of guarding the camp seriously, came from the farther tepee and stood with arms crossed over his chest.
Two of the horsemen sat their horses a distance away and one rider came on, heeling his mount to a stop a few feet from the boy. He sat for a moment and stared arrogantly down at him.
“Where Lenning?”
The boy waved his hand toward the north.
“Where?”
“North.”
“North is big,” the Indian retorted angrily.
The boy lifted his shoulders. He did not like this man whose tongue was not straight.
“Where Lenning? I bring message from Iron Jaw.”
“How I know that?” The boy was enjoying this brief interlude of authority.
“You say I lie?”
“I did not say you lie.”
“Do I go back and tell Iron Jaw that a boy who has not yet performed his hanblecheyapi and entered into manhood refused to warn Lenning?”
The barb was so personal that it shook the boy’s confidence and when he spoke, his voice trembled.
“Warn Lenning?” He had a great fondness for the Wasicun who had trusted him to do a man’s job.
“Lenning must be told that bad white man make camp on Billy Creek. Iron Jaw send warrior to tell Lenning.”
“Why did you not say that? Lenning go to Wheeler Creek.”
“When?”
“Morning.”
“Daylight?”
The boy nodded and was relieved when the Indian whirled his mount and rode toward the trees. The others followed. As soon as they were out of sight of the camp the warrior stopped, held up his hand and gestured toward the north.
“Lenning go Wheeler Creek. It long way. Go. See he not come back long time.”
“How we do that?”
“Stupid crow! You are but cow dung!” Runs Fast snarled. “Have you nothing in your head? Frighten herd with brushfire. Lenning not come back soon.”
“Brushfire?”
“It is what I said, stupid one. A warrior does what he has to do.” Runs Fast wheeled his horse and rode to the top of a hill where he could look down on the ranch buildings.
The two young warriors who, until now, had been impressed by the older man’s flamboyant ways and had begun to copy his actions, moved their ponies deeper into the trees before they stopped.
“It is wrong to start fire,” one said softly and looked over his shoulder.
“Runs Fast one crazy Indian. Lenning kill man who start fire.”
“Iron Jaw kill him, too.”
“Brushfire enemy of all people.”
“Spirit wind bring fire down mountain to Iron Jaw camp. It is bad. Very bad. We should go long way from crazy man who asked it.”
“He will be very angry.”
“Not as angry as Lenning when Runs Fast takes his woman.” The warrior turned his pony toward the mountains and the other pony followed.
On the hill, Runs Fast surveyed the ranch with a spyglass, hoping to get a glimpse of the woman he called White Flower. He had seen her in his vision and believed that she was not of this earth. Her hair was sunlight itself. She was the sun, a flower blossoming in a pure day. He could no more walk away from her than he could cease to breathe.
When she was his, he would be the only warrior in all this vast land with a wife with silver hair. He would bury his manhood in the silvery nest between her legs and beget sons that would lead the Sioux to retake their land. She would be his talisman. With her beside him, he would be immortal.
The Indian smiled. The Gods were pleased with him. He had persuaded Iron Jaw to send Bowlegs as his representative to grieve for a subchief at a camp on Porcupine Butte. The grieving ceremony would last two days. All who remained at the ranch were wet-eared drovers who would be at their sentry posts, a cripple and a light-haired Wasicun in a silly hat. Old Gilly usually went to the bluff over the road, and the dog was used to Indian smell.
All was ready.
* * *
Gilly was the first to come in to supper. The men had been eating in shifts since the Gateses and Gustaf arrived. Gilly would relieve Gustaf. Then Gustaf would relieve Bernie.
“There isn’t a reason in the world I couldn’t take one of the watches,” Bonnie said, and dished up a large dish of bread pudding for Gilly after he’d finished off a plate of fluffy dumplings that had been cooked with the meat of a young rabbit he had brought to the house that morning.
“Fine and dandy with me, missy. Ya can take mine. It’s five miles out on the bluff.” Gilly liked the spunky girl and liked to tease her. “Only thing is, thar’s a nest a rattlers on that bluff. Don’t reckon they’d bite ya though. It’d be dark, and they’d think ya was me.”
“Gilly, you’re the biggest storyteller I ever heard of. You’d put the devil hisself to shame when it comes to lyin’.”
Kristin watched and listened to Bonnie and Gilly and wished that she could be that lighthearted. A half an hour later when Gustaf came to supper, she noticed that Bonnie made sure that she waited on him.
After Gustaf washed, he threw his arm across Kristin’s shoulders.
“You look worn out, love.”
“I’m not. Bonnie cooked most of the supper.�
��
“She did? Goshamighty! I’m hungry as a starved wolf and was plannin’ on havin’ me some decent vittles.”
Kristin’s glance slid quickly to Bonnie. She had picked up a wooden spoon and rapped Gustaf smartly across the knuckles. They were laughing at each other as if they were the only two people in the room. He likes her! Oh, I’m glad. Maybe he’ll want to stay here and make his home in the West with . . . Bonnie.
“You don’t get any bread puddin’ for that remark.” Bonnie filled a plate with dumplings while Kristin sliced the fresh bread.
“Kris, did I hear somebody say bread puddin’?”
“You sure did, and in a couple of weeks, if we’re still here, you can have milk with your bread puddin’.”
“If we’re still here? Ya think Buck is goin’ to run us off?”
“We are a bother to him, Gustaf,” Kristin replied.
Bonnie stood at the end of the table looking from one to the other with large, brown, serious eyes. She shook her head.
“Buck will never ask you to leave, Kristin.”
“I know. He’s too nice a man for that. He feels responsible for me because of Uncle Yarby.”
Gustaf almost choked on a mouthful of dumplings. His eyes caught Bonnie’s and held.
“Some folks are blind as bats, huh, Bonnie?”
“Yeah. And they’ve got cousins that are dumb as stumps.”
“Well, now. I wonder who that could be.”
Bonnie was quiet for a long while after Gustaf went out.
“Your cousin is a flirt,” she finally said, then added with a sigh, “some men are born flirts.”
“I never considered Gustaf a flirt. He has a sunny disposition and gets along well with everyone. He has a serious side, too, and takes his responsibilities to heart. That’s why he came out here to see about me. He encouraged me to come here and collect my inheritance.”
When Bernie came in, it was easy to see that he was tired. He washed and came slowly to the table.
“Smells good,” he said, and smiled at Kristin.
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