“It seems further now.”
“You know I would never do anything to hurt you, Barb. I seriously think this would do you good. You may even enjoy it."
“Pastor White's people hate me for adjusting his profile. The folks at the firehouse are scared because they saw the way I wrapped up one of their men. I can’t imagine that I’ll be met by anything but hostility over there."
"This was partly Wayne's idea. He's fully behind it and I think he's right. You need more room to spread your wings and see what you're made of. There’s no point in me giving you all these skills and never letting you use them."
"So this house isn’t big enough for the two of us?" she asked. "Just like a line from some cheesy Western?"
Conor laughed. "You know my house is always our house. There will never be a time or place in this world where you are not welcome at my side. This won’t be easy for me either, Barb. I'll worry about you constantly. I’ll never walk through this house that I don’t wonder where you are and what you’re doing.”
Barb glanced away, watching a squirrel trace an ascending spiral path up a poplar. "You know, Dad, my first reaction was to be pissed off. I felt like you were pushing me out of the house to make room for Ragus, Shannon, and Doc Marty. I don’t feel that way anymore. I understand you're right. I do feel confined and I'm not certain I even understood that until you said it. I'd like to try this. Like you said, I think it would be good for me. If I get over there and I hate it I can always come home, right? You aren’t going to change the locks on me, are you?"
Conor’s heart was too heavy to laugh. It was the first time he ever felt as if he was sending his baby girl out into the world on her own. It felt like she was going away to college or to get married or something. It was a tiny step but things would never be the same again. She would still be his daughter but she would also be her own woman in a way she’d never been before. He had an idea that she would find excitement and adventure in the world. As for him, he’d immediately feel much older and much more alone than he'd ever felt before.
"So when do I leave?"
"That's entirely up to you, but we could go tomorrow if you want. That will give you time to pack your gear. I'll take a pack horse for your food and gear, then bring it back with me."
"Well, I guess I need to get back to the house so I can get started. You sure you’ll be okay without me, old man?"
Conor couldn't answer. Exhaustion made the emotions run close to the surface. He muttered something, aware that anything he said might turn into a sob. He couldn't count the number of men he’d killed, both in the name of business and patriotism. He’d done some nasty things to some nasty people. Yet a heart-to-heart talk with his little girl could floor him like nothing else.
21
The next morning they secured the compound and headed out as a group. They planned on being back that evening -- everyone except Barb, that is -- but plans could change on a dime. They made sure all their animals had food and water for a few days, then locked everything up tight. Doc Marty and Shannon had followed Conor's advice to go check in on Miss Fannie Bell the previous day, just after Conor got home, so today’s visit would be a follow-up. Conor led a pack horse with personal gear and provisions for Barb. He was confident Johnny Jacks would treat her like family, that was the kind of man he was, but Conor didn't want to be a drag on anyone else's supplies. She would take her own food and ammo. Ragus was just tagging along for the ride. He'd become so proficient at running the compound lately that he got stuck there taking care of things more often than he cared for.
"That's the price you pay for making yourself useful, lad,” Conor teased. “Had you been a laggard I’d have to make other arrangements."
The mood of the group was somewhat subdued. Doc Marty and Conor refrained from jabbing at each other in their normal manner. Barb kept to herself and held back on the typical snide comments that escaped her mouth as easy as an exhalation. She wasn't upset about the turn of events. Her silence was due to thoughtfulness about what lay ahead of her. It would be an entirely new experience in a whole range of ways. She was used to being part of a team with her father and this adventure would be more of a solo experience. In fact, that was the whole point. She felt capable of taking care of anything she might face but her mind couldn’t sit still. It kept jumping to scenarios.
Conor intuitively understood that his daughter was lost in thought. It was like the serious state she fell into before a mission. Doc Marty, Shannon, and Ragus were uncertain as to how to read the situation. They took her silence for broodiness or anger, both of which could be concerning in the hands of Barb. From what they knew of her, if Barb wasn’t happy, no one was happy.
They reached the entrance to Johnny's place at midmorning. A strong sun followed an overnight frost and a chilly morning. The group took advantage of the pause to shed some layers and stash them in their packs.
"I think Shannon and I will ride on over to Pastor White's camp," Doc Marty said. "Say hello to Johnny for me. Tell him I’ll pop in on my way back through if he has any concerns about how he’s healing."
Conor nodded. "He's a tough old bird. Appears to be healing well from what I can see. He’s moving around and he wants to live. That’s important because I've known men to die from what he went through."
"Same here," Doc Marty said. “The whole family is made of tough stuff.”
"What about me?" Ragus asked. "You want me with you, Conor, or do you want me to go with Doc Marty and Shannon?"
Conor knew where the lad wanted to go. He and Shannon were nearly inseparable so he thought a little space might do them good. It would force the boy to get his head out of his ass and pay attention to his surroundings. "You stay with me, lad. After we get Barb squared away the three of us will ride over to the firehouse. I want to let Wayne know that Barb's around."
"So you think he needs fair warning?" Barb asked. "Maybe you should just put a warning sign at the end of the gate, like I'm a vicious dog or something."
Conor grinned. "Now there’s an idea. But no, that’s not the point. The idea is that he might actually be able to use you as a resource. He gets sucked into a lot of these things like hunting for Miss Fannie Bell, but he has a lot on his plate. He’s trying to get his people and that firehouse in order for winter. He can’t take care of that if people are depending on him to police their community. I’m hoping he’ll refer some of those situations in your direction."
"Yeah right," Barb said, unconvinced. “This whole community is more likely to burn me at the stake than depend on me for help.”
Johnny's dog had picked up on the sound of their conversation and began barking. Doc Marty and Shannon took this as their cue to leave and departed with a wave. Ragus walked the gate open from the back of his horse. Conor slipped through leading the pack horse, Barb on their heels. Ragus tried to shut the gate in the same way he’d opened it but found it difficult. He couldn’t get his horse positioned just right so he ended up jumping off and doing it the old-fashioned way. By the time Ragus caught up with Conor and Barb, Johnny’s entire family had filtered out onto the porch to greet their guests. As Conor knew they would, they greeted Barb as if she were a long-lost family member. That made Conor much more comfortable with the situation. Despite all the things Barb was, she was still his baby girl.
Jason took the lead for the pack horse from Conor and tied it off to the porch. He wasn’t a man who waited around to be asked before jumping into a task. He began unpacking Barb’s gear and stacking it on the porch. “All this go?”
“It does,” Conor replied. “I’ll take the horse back with me. I figure you have plenty of horses around if she needs a pack animal while she’s here.”
Jason chuckled. His dad was an infamous trader and rescuer of horses that people couldn’t care for. He usually had dozens of animals at a time, though he’d been trading off a lot of them recently. The lack of fuel brought about a proportional increase in people’s desire to have animals that ran off
grass instead of gas.
Ragus dismounted and tied off his own horse. Unsure of what else to do, he began carrying Barb's gear into the house. "What do I do with this stuff?”
"I'll show you," Sam said. She grabbed a heavy ammo can and rushed inside the house. "Barb will be upstairs.”
“This bag is heavy,” Ragus called back out the door. “This your makeup and perfume, Barb?”
She ignored him, sitting on her horse and staring at the house. He wondered for a moment if she had changed her mind. If she did, he couldn’t force her to stay. They’d continue on and he’d try to find some new way to deal with what she was going through.
Johnny, perhaps sensing her hesitation, her uncertainty, spoke up. "Barb, we sure are glad to have you. Our house is your house. Besides just having someone new to speak to around here, it's comforting to have someone with your skills around the house. We’ve done the best we can but we’re obviously not covering all bases." To emphasize his point, he gestured toward one of his healing wounds.
Conor wondered if Barb might live up to her name and reply was some smartass retort. Some remark about how she appreciated Johnny taking her in when her own father threw her out of the house to make room for strangers. She didn’t though. She smiled warmly -- actually smiled a genuine smile -- and told Johnny, "I appreciate you having me. I’ll be glad to help out in any way I can."
Conor couldn’t hold back a smile of his own. This was going to work out after all. He just knew it.
"I guess you know where the barn and the paddock are if you want to turn out your horse," Johnny offered.
Barb looked at her father, uncertain about how to reply, and he took over.
"Johnny, I think we’re going to run down to Wayne’s camp since it’s early. I want to let him know Barb is going to be staying with you for a while."
“He wants to warn him,” Barb told Johnny, rolling her eyes.
Johnny laughed. “That should be good. You should let the pastor know too." Johnny was too old to leave thoughts unsaid. He wasn’t an unkind man but saw no reason to hold back. He called them like he saw them.
"I’ll keep my feet firmly in the stirrups," Barb said. “No kicking.”
Johnny winked at her and grinned.
“I have hopes she and the pastor will eventually shake hands and make nice but that’s between them,” Conor said. “I'll not press the issue."
Barb finally climbed off her horse and Johnny held the door for her to go inside. She wasn’t the homey sort. She cared more about utility and function than comfort. It didn't much matter to her where she slept as long as she could sleep comfortably enough to wake up feeling ready to go. She’d been so young when her mother died that she didn’t even recall living in a house decorated with a woman’s touch. She stared at the decor, feeling a little out of place.
Sam, perhaps eager to have another female in the house, was excited to show Barb the accommodations that had been made for her. Out of politeness -- yes, Barb could be polite -- she followed Sam up the stairs to the neat bedroom that had been set up for her. She reminded Sam that she didn’t want them to go to any trouble for her but that she was appreciative of the effort they'd made. She didn’t always use her manners. Not all folks were deserving of them but these people were. They were among the good ones and she had nothing to prove to them. No boundaries to establish nor territory to squabble over.
Worried that his daughter might be uncomfortable being the focus of so much attention Conor called to her from downstairs, letting her know he was ready to ride to Wayne’s camp at the firehouse. He asked if any of the family wanted to go with them but everyone passed on the offer.
"I'm not fit for the saddle," Johnny said, shaking his head in disappointment. “I tire quickly and there's holes in my middle that ache if I jostle around too much."
Conor patted the man on the back. "Well, I certainly don't want to get you in trouble with Doc Marty. He gets a little bent out of shape when his patients aren’t following his instructions."
Johnny nodded, wide-eyed. He did indeed understand the wrath of Doc Marty and Shannon, having suffered it when he tried to get back to his farm chores a little too early.
"What about you, Jason?" Conor asked as they all filed out onto the front porch.
"Nah, fences to check. Four pregnant mares needing attention. The list goes on from there."
Conor understood. Farming had been a family activity up until machinery had allowed one man to do the work of several. Without the machinery there was a huge labor gap revealing itself. Even those with horses lacked the proper horse-drawn equipment to put them to work.
The trio mounted their horses, said their good-byes, and headed down the driveway. They paused at a shallow brook that ran along the road and allowed their horses to drink.
“Those are good people," Conor remarked. It was an offhand statement, merely voicing the thoughts passing through his head.
It was such an obvious statement that no one felt a need to respond to it. They sat in silence, listening to horses lap at the water, until Ragus spoke up. "Yeah, we’re hoping some of it rubs off on you, Barb."
Conor snapped his head toward Ragus in surprise, ready to launch himself between them. Barb’s face revealed her own shock. Ragus gave them an innocent grin. To Conor’s relief, Barb began laughing at his audacity and Conor soon joined in.
Ragus’s offhand comment had been uncharacteristically bold. Considering Barb's temperament of late, it had almost been foolhardy, perhaps even dangerous, but it broke the tension that defined the relationship between the three for the last weeks. They were suddenly back to being the family they’d been before Doc Marty and Shannon had arrived.
Barb laughed until there were tears in her eyes. "There will be payback for that, kid. You won't know when and you won’t know where there will be payback," Barb said, giving Ragus a wink.
After the horses drank their fill the riders directed them back onto the road and toward the firehouse. Despite the fact that Pastor White's camp lay unavoidably between there and the firehouse, Conor was as happy as he’d been a while. In their laughter, he felt as if order had been restored. You never knew what it would take to set the world right sometimes. It was never what you thought. You could plot and strategize all you wanted but sometimes the stupidest, most random thing worked the miracle that you needed.
22
Conor and his group did not have to pass through Pastor White’s security to reach the firehouse. Their guard station didn’t block the main road but was off to the side, instead blocking the entrance to the pastor’s camp and his roadside church. The guard post was really nothing more than a token gesture because no fences separated the church property from the roadway. Conor could simply ride ten feet past the sentry, turn his horse to the right, and he’d be in the yard of the church. If there was ever a real threat in this community, they’d have to do something a little different. He understood that the church was the center of their lives but the location couldn’t have been any worse from a defensive standpoint.
He noticed that the guard was the same lanky, hatchet-faced man he’d dealt with yesterday when passing through. Jackson had been his name, Conor recalled. He didn’t know if that familiarity would be a good or bad thing. The sentry completely ignored Conor, having established some boundaries with him on their previous encounter, but Barb got the same squinty-eyed and hawkish expression that Conor had received yesterday. It was a glowering gesture of hostility, an acknowledgement that Jackson knew who Barb was and she wasn’t welcome there.
“Should I lunge at him and see if he flinches?” Barb whispered, smirking.
“He’d pee on himself,” Ragus said.
“No,” Conor said. “I told you we wouldn’t stop here unless asked to do so.”
“Yeah, like that’s going to happen,” Barb said.
“Perhaps not today but at some point I expect it will,” Conor said. “They’re going to need us and we’re going to need them.”
/> “You might have mentioned that before I tried to amputate the pastor’s face with my foot.”
Conor shot her a look. “I recall suggesting you both cool out a little and it did no good.”
“Cool out?” Ragus asked.
“He means chill out,” Barb said. “He’s not as hip as he thinks.”
“Oh, don’t doubt me, my child. I’m way more hip than you think. Keep badgering me and I’ll climb up on a car at the firehouse and do me twerky dance.”
“You’ll only be embarrassing yourself, old man,” Barb replied. “I long ago grew immune to your antics.”
“We’ll see.”
No one from the pastor’s camp hailed them. If Pastor White himself was about, he didn’t show himself. There were no hurled insults or snide comments, nor were there any threats. The looks they received were not inviting but they also didn’t carry the promise of violence. They appeared to be people more disappointed in the actions of another than ready to kill over them. Was it possible that Conor returning Miss Fannie Bell to them had earned some points and broken the ice? Would they be willing to give his group the benefit of the doubt? That remained to be seen.
From the road they could see that the pastor’s camp was at full hum. People were moving around and cooking. Others were cleaning clothes in washtubs of steaming water. The men were gathered in tight circles and speaking conspiratorially between themselves.
"Well, that went well," Ragus said when they were out of sight of the camp.
“They must've been petrified with fear," Barb quipped.
“I could swear that I saw a couple holding onto their jaws,” Ragus said. “Just in case your feet started flying.”
"They also knew you were coming," Conor said. "Doc Marty and Shannon are in there somewhere seeing to Miss Fannie Bell. The pastor may have expected us to stop and instructed his people to behave if you showed up. Do I need to give you that same lecture?"
Brutal Business: Book Three in the Mad Mick Series Page 14