“Seems to me you could use a hand, seein’ as your head’s been turned by a female.”
Trace settled back against his saddle, stared into the fire. “I don’t want you underfoot. Not that I don’t appreciate the offer, but I can’t afford distractions. And that’s what you’d be. I don’t want to bury you, either.”
“Might be one way to look at it,” Pappy mused. “But from where I’m sitting, maybe it was your lucky day when I stumbled upon your camp, maybe it happened for a reason. Maybe having me watch your back would be good—might save your life. You might be glad you brung me. See, no pretty female has me all hepped up like a stallion scenting a mare. A thing like that is mighty distracting. When you throw down against a pack of varmints, another gun protecting your back might make all the difference. Ever think of that?”
Trace ran his hand through his hair and breathed an exasperated nasal sigh. This was not how things were supposed to be. He’d had everything planned before a horse thief smelling of wild clover, with hair like sunset gold and eyes like a doe, crashed into his life. His loins responded to the memories of Mae’s soft skin, her full white breasts. Pulling a blanket over his legs, he shifted uneasily.
The old man sniggered, not fooled. “Thinking, are you?”
“I’m going after my horse,” Trace responded.
“I figured. The woman has nothing to do it.” Pappy began fixing his bedroll. “And that’s another thing—I’m a damn fine tracker, nearly as good as an Injun. Might come in handy tomorrow trying to pick up their trail.”
“Is there anything you aren’t good at, old man?” Trace asked.
“Jack-of-all-trades, master of few,” came the reply. “Unless you say otherwise, I’m assuming I’ll be heading out with you at first light.”
“Even if I said no, I have a feeling you’d just trail along anyways.” Trace slid down against his saddle, fighting a yawn. It had been a hard day. He needed to get some sleep.
“Maybe you ain’t half as stupid as that damn burro of yours. Been kind of lonely out here. Our paths crossing seems fated, so I reckon I’ll be tagging along.”
“Just one thing,” said Trace, stretching out. “If you’re going to tag along, stay out of my way, and when I tell you something, I expect you to listen. I don’t want to be repeating myself. A man’s life depends on quick thought and even quicker action.”
Not waiting for an answer, he rolled over to get some much-needed rest. His feet were sore from the stones and his imprudent assault on Diablo’s hobbles, not to mention the miles of tracking Diablo and the woman. Only, sleep didn’t come. His blankets smelled of wild clover—of Mae.
He awoke with a start just as the sky began to lighten, to the smell of fresh coffee and a hand like wrinkled leather shaking his shoulder. His gun left his holster before his eyes focused.
“Whoooooa, Ord! It’s me,” the old man chuckled. “Ain’t worth wasting the bullet.”
“Don’t ever do that,” Trace growled.
“You’d best hop to,” the old man urged. “You made it sound as if you wanted to be off by first light. Maybe we better shake a leg? I don’t like the looks of that sky. The air’s so thick you could cut it with a knife.”
Trace accepted a tin of hot coffee, then took note Pappy had already packed up the rest of the camp. Maybe allowing him to tag along wouldn’t be so bad after all.
Pappy pushed a plate at him. “Not much—just some leftover stew and a hard biscuit. Soak it in your coffee and it’ll soften it up. You need grub in your belly if’n you plan to catch up to your horse and your woman.”
“The woman ain’t mine.” Trace picked up a fork. “And I’ve ate coffee-soaked biscuits more times than I care to remember. Daily diet for a Johnny Reb.”
“Figured you for one, what with that accent.” Pappy studied him with a sharp eye. “Tough to place. Ain’t hard like Tennessee, nor heavy on the drawl like Mississippi. Planters stock, I’m a-guessing. Georgia or Alabamie.”
Trace gave a faint nod, not really wanting to think about the past or why he’d come out West—to get away from all that had been taken or destroyed in his life. It was easier to forget when you weren’t reminded of the way things used to be.
“Louisiana. Not far from Baton Rouge,” Trace admitted grudgingly, hoping that Pappy would allow it to drop.
“A renegade rider…Hmm, bet you rode for old Nathan Bedford Forrest during the war.” The old man’s brows lifted in challenge, daring him to deny it. “His boys could ride.”
Trace shook his head. “You know, Pappy, my mama used to tell me stories back from England and Ireland, where my family hailed from. She said hundreds of years ago they used to burn or hang people for being witches. You better be glad you were born now. You would have been dancin’ on the wind.”
Pappy tossed sand onto the campfire to put it out. “ ’Tain’t nothin’ magic about it. I just watch. A lot of people are too busy flapping their jaws.”
Trace chuckled. “Seems to me you do a fair amount of jaw-flapping yourself.”
The old man shrugged and studied the pink and purple horizon toward the east. “Well, might just be me flapping my jaw now, but I fear a sandstorm might be kicking up. See how misty it looks back in the canyon? That ain’t good. We’d better make tracks, and pray that haze burns off when the sun comes up.”
Trace hated to admit it, but the old man was right. Again.
The haze did not burn off. The saffron sun rose, cloaked in a jaundiced gray veil draped like a pall over the entire canyon, and the air was thick despite the occasional gust that whistled through. It was like inhaling near a campfire.
“Where’d you leave that marker?” the old man asked as they led their mules up the rocky draw.
“Not much farther,” said Trace. “There’s a spring with a stand of cottonwood trees.”
“Well, we might reach it too late. See that yellow fog rising from the canyon floor?”
Trace nodded, taking his kerchief from his pocket to wipe his face.
“That ain’t haze like before, that’s sand, and it’s coming our way. We’re going to need shelter here, pronto. Afraid your woman’s trail is going to get blown away.”
Trace pulled his bandana up over his mouth and nose, hating that the old man was right. The storm seemed to hit them from everywhere, a hissing, howling whoosh of wind that sucked up the sand from beneath them and blasted the entire canyon. A great wall of it eclipsed the sun, making day into an eerie gray-green twilight. Despite the protection of the bandana, the sand stung his ears, clogged his mouth and nose, and left grit in his clenched teeth.
Trace tugged the brim of his Stetson down over his eyes, struggling to find shelter. Blind against the wind, he and Pappy trusted their burros’ instincts to find water. Suddenly the ghostly trunks of the cottonwoods loomed before them.
He helped Pappy drag a blanket from his pack while the burros huddled together, their faces behind the trunks of the trees. He couldn’t help it; he had to laugh. Crouching low, the two men sank down beside the tree and huddled together as the merciless waves of sand swept over them.
Pappy glared. “Damn fool! What’s so funny? You have a chaw of locoweed?”
“Sorry. The asses have their asses turned into the wind.” Trace tried to regain seriousness, given the gravity of their situation, but then Pappy laughed, which returned Trace’s humor. Sometimes life was so damn ridiculous that laughing was the only thing you could do. Here he was, huddled under a blanket with a bossy old coot and about to be buried alive. He was no closer to getting onto the Lazy C than he’d been a few days before, and his horse had been stolen twice—and a certain beautiful horse thief was most likely in the grasp of a gang of outlaws.
The last thought was sobering. Images of the war returned: homes burned, lives destroyed. Women hadn’t fared too well, as Mr. Lincoln’s war had seemed to set loose an ugliness in men that made respect and gentle manners a way of the past. Trace wondered if Mae was healthy. Had infection set i
n? His stomach muscles tightened with fear as he pictured her abused by five or six men. He’d encountered women—one woman in particular—in the wake of such brutality. Or, rather, the shells of these women. One had been his sister, Annelee.
Trace might have shed a tear—for his sister, for Mae—but it was hard to tell in the dust storm. All he could do was shake from the painful memories and fear, and pray.
Sand piled up against the blanket Pappy and he desperately clutched, heavy, anchoring them to the spot. The grit worked its way under the edges, sharp as needles against any exposed skin. But while the time was painful and immeasurable, eventually the storm spent itself. The wind slowly died down, picked up again briefly, then gradually carried the driving sand westward. Trace was unsure how long the storm had lasted. It seemed like years. They shoved their way out from under the blanket.
The brim of Trace’s Stetson was heavy with sand. It clogged his ears and blurred his vision. It overflowed his boot tops and had collected underneath his shirt collar. The damn stuff had even worked its way under his shirt.
Trace struggled to his feet, took off his hat, and knocked it against his thigh. He tried to spit but lacked enough moisture to do so. “I thought storms like that only happened in the desert,” he choked out, again trying in vain to clear his mouth of the gritty particles.
“Damn dust devil. Look at what you’re standing on.” The old man coughed. “Wherever there’s sand, you’re going to have sandstorms.”
“We never had sandstorms in Louisiana,” Trace complained.
Pappy chuckled. “No, but I heard you have big blows called hurricanes.”
Trace stared past the trees to the valley beyond, his heart heavy. There was little hope any trace of Mae or Diablo remained. The wind had covered everything in sand; the stuff was knee deep in some places. The horse tracks had vanished as though they never existed.
Chapter Four
It seemed fate had it in for Trace Ord. In the course of the month since he’d left the ranchers up north to locate their stolen horses, his whole life had changed. His horse had been stolen by a baffling female, which had forced him to cancel his plans to capture the elusive wild stallion, Standing Thunder, and now he’d taken on excess baggage in the person of a crusty old wanderer.
He’d dubbed his companion Preacher after a particularly long sermon the old man gave. Damn old-timer rambled incessantly. He’d implied he had a dark past, which sometimes made him contemplative, though he’d shrugged off giving any details. Trace respected that, not being willing to give any details of his own. He liked the old man. Still—and though a lot of what he said had merit—Preacher’s constant yammering made it hard for Trace to concentrate. A loner, Trace was used to silence. Preacher talked so much he feared his ears might bleed. Now, when he needed his wits about him as never before, his nerves were frayed to a raveling.
He was at the end of his tether by the time they reached the last semblance of civilization east of the Hualapai Mountains and the Lazy C. It was a strange town, so small that Trace could hardly believe the mail coach even stopped. No dwellings, only establishments. If someone had ever christened it, no one seemed to know the name anymore. “The Outpost” was all anyone knew. It consisted of—and these first things were all under one roof—a general store, a saloon, a hotel, and a bath house complete with weathered, steelbanded wooden tubs. Next door was a combination livery and blacksmith. The closest thing to a law officer of the so-called town was a circuit judge who, Trace was told, put in an appearance every three months or so. But even that wasn’t set in stone, since a dispute over the territory’s western border was still a bone of contention.
Trace spread the word that he and the old man were drifters—a wrangler and a camp cook—looking to hire on with any outfit that would have them. They were quickly directed to the Lazy C, which was precisely what Trace had hoped. There weren’t any other spreads in the area, and it had become quickly apparent that Jared Comstock owned the Outpost, lock, stock, and barrel. The place existed almost solely to serve the needs of the Lazy C.
At the general store Trace replaced his spare shirt that Mae had taken when she ran away, and much of his sandblasted wardrobe, then headed for a good long soak, a shave, and a haircut at the bath house. Dust and sand coated his body like a second skin beneath his clothes, and he’d nearly scratched himself raw in spots. Getting his companion to follow suit was another matter entirely, but persis tent threats finally won out.
After a filling if not particularly palatable meal, they paid a visit to the livery. There Trace bought himself a respectable-looking sorrel mare that answered to the name of Duchess. She was no Diablo, but she was healthy and fast enough to pass for a wrangler’s mount. Preacher balked at the idea of a horse for himself, opting to stick to driving the burros. Though that would slow them down, Trace had to agree that it better suited the old man’s image.
It was a half-day’s distance to the ranch, and by the time their personal business was done the sun had slipped behind the mountains, capping those hazy purple spires with rivulets of crimson and gold. Trace viewed the flaming sunset with a wistful uneasiness, seeing the exact color of Mae’s hair. He hoped to God she was all right. Why that should be, when anger seemed a more appropriate response to the bedeviling little horse thief, he couldn’t imagine. But some things just were.
Anxious to reach the Lazy C, Trace decided it was best they not spend the night in town. Instead, they headed out and traveled until night fell. They made camp in the inky blackness and slept under the stars.
When they approached the Lazy C the next day, noon was near. The spread was far grander than Trace expected. A sprawling compound, it boasted a halftimbered ranch house, with bunkhouse, stables, and corrals tucked behind, well out of view. Though he could hear horses, none were visible.
The spread backed up to the mountains. Owing to the lay in the land, there was only one possible approach to the ranch: the trail they now traveled. All in all, from first impression, the Lazy C had all the earmarks of a rustler’s paradise.
Trace’s demeanor changed with every step as they guided the animals closer. His eyes—sharp as an eagle’s—and keen nose missed nothing, neither the hawks swooping overhead nor the muffled sounds and tantalizing smells of roast meat coming from the ranch house. He sat his horse with spine straight. Every sinew was taut. He was all renegade rider, aloof yet ready for anything.
“Let me do the talking,” he said to Preacher as they approached the hitching rail in front of the house. “Just follow my lead and don’t volunteer anything. They’re probably expecting us after all the noise I made back at the Outpost about looking for work. I did that on purpose. Our coming out here needs to look natural. If Jared Comstock and his riders are what I think, they’ll pick up on an ambush quick as you can spit and holler howdy.”
“Suppose they take you on and not me?” the old man asked.
Trace growled. “Let’s just take things as they come, eh? Don’t go borrowing trouble. We’ve been lent enough as is.”
He was about to swing out of his saddle when a wiry, hatless man strode out onto the ranch house porch, spurs jangling, and sized them up with a hooded gaze that turned Trace’s blood cold. “You have a purpose for being here, you better state it quick,” the man snarled.
“We’re looking for work,” Trace responded. “Folks back at the Outpost said you might be looking to hire a wrangler and camp cook. Said to see Jared Comstock. Would that be you?”
“It would not,” the stranger replied, raking them with skeptical eyes. “He’ll be along, but we don’t need no help.”
“Well, since we’ve come this far, we’ll stick around and ask him anyway—if it’s all the same to you,” said Trace.
The stranger shrugged. “Suit yourself. I don’t much care how you waste your time, but I’m foreman here—the name’s Will Morgan—and I say we ain’t hiring.”
“Well, Will Morgan, my name’s Ord, and this here is Preacher. He make
s the best son-of-a-bitch stew this side of the Mississippi; I can vouch for that myself. And we’ll hang around awhile.”
“Wait there, then.” Morgan crooked his thumb toward the bunkhouse. “Outside. Like I say, I don’t much care how you waste your time.” The foreman spun on his heel and stalked back inside.
Neither Trace nor Preacher spoke until they’d rounded the corner toward the bunkhouse and were out of earshot. Horses were visible now, some ambling in a nearby paddock, some grazing in the pasture directly behind. Two riders were cutting several out of the herd to be branded.
Stolen or no, some fine horses were on the spread, judging from what Trace could see. But he needed to get closer. The pastureland stretched way back to the mountains. There were groves and valleys and outcroppings of rocks in the hazy distance that could conceal anything, and it stood to reason that rustled horses would be kept well out of view.
“What do you think?” Preacher asked.
“Not a very sociable welcome,” Trace observed. “About what I expected, though. That fella needs taking down a peg.”
“And you think you’re just the man for the job? From the look of that thundercloud you’re wearing for a face, I’ll bet you’re just itching.”
“Not ’til I do what I’ve come for,” Trace responded. “Personal feeling don’t enter into it. All that can wait.”
“Well, it don’t appear that the wait’ll be long,” the old man replied.
A tall, lean rider was fast approaching on a black stallion. He was fair-complexioned and broad-shouldered, wore a gray Stetson and jeans too new to have seen much work, and a crisp white shirt billowing in the wind. His eyes were deep-set and dark, his mouth a thin, lipless line beneath a sandy mustache. Trace swallowed dry. His jaw muscle began to tick, and when he touched the brim of his hat in greeting, it was only with the tips of his rigid thumb and forefinger. The rest of his fingers were balled into a white-knuckled fist.
“What in the hell’s the matter with you?” Preacher whispered, leaning toward him. “You’ve gone white as a cotton field! You know this hombre or something?”
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