“You don’t get a day of rest.” Frisco scanned a slow frown around the circle. “If you’re tired, get to sleep earlier.”
“Freddy, come back here,” Alex shouted. “You don’t walk off and leave your plate on the ground. You put it in the… in the…” She looked helplessly at Frisco.
“The wreck pan,” he said to Freddy. “Shake off any leftovers, then put your plate in the pan of water up there on the wagon’s worktable.”
Thin-lipped, Freddy did as she was instructed, then looked down at Alex. “That’s the worst meal I’ve ever refused to eat. We’re all going to starve long before we reach Abilene.”
Stung, Alex stabbed her fork into the damp ground. “It won’t matter because we won’t have any steers left anyway. Not if you run them all off like you did yesterday!” She’d heard about Freddy’s idiotic performance.
Alex watched her sister stamp back toward the house, realizing that she had resented Freddy all of her life, and Les, too. While she washed up the tin dishes, feeling sorry for herself, she thought about growing up with stepmothers who hadn’t liked her and seldom noticed her. In their opinions, she existed solely to look after their babies.
“What are you thinking about?” Frisco asked, reminding her that he was standing nearby, watching her try to balance on her crutch and wash dishes at the same time.
“Reviewing old grudges,” she said, surprising herself by the honesty of the answer.
“It’d be better if you’d review your biscuit recipe instead,” he suggested.
She looked up, prepared to take his head off, but saw the twinkle in his eye. After a brief hesitation, she laughed. “I’m never going to be a good cook. I don’t have the knack for it.”
“Maybe you’ll get better with experience,” he said, walking down the side of the wagon, checking that she’d retrieved all the utensils and hung them properly. “I know you can’t harness the mules to the wagon—”
“No, I can’t,” she said in a weary voice. There were so many things that she couldn’t do.
“So Grady will take on that chore. That’s him, bringing up the team now,” he added, looking toward the side of the house. “Have you driven before?”
“I used to drive a buckboard into town on occasion.” Grady waved at her as he came around the house, leading four mules that didn’t look to her untrained eye as if they had been gentled to harness. “That was a long time ago,” she said, pressing her hands together and watching the animals. “And it was only two horses.”
“But you have some experience. Good. Here’s the routine. The minute you’re packed up, you follow the pilot to the nooning camp. The trail to Abilene is well marked, so we’ll rotate the pilot’s assignment. Some days it will be me. Most days the pilot will be someone I trust to choose a good site, usually beside water if we can manage it. And we’ll always set up camp to the left of the bedding or grazing ground so the hands know where the food is and where to find their bedrolls. After the pilot decides on the campsite, he’ll leave you and hightail it back to the herd.”
Her face paled. “I’ll be alone out there? On the range?” She couldn’t think of anything worse.
“The remuda follows you. Grady won’t be far behind.”
Her relief was followed by concern. “Just how fast will I be traveling to stay ahead of the herd?” How fast did cattle move? She had no idea.
Frisco grinned and her heart plummeted. “The pilot sets the pace, and your job is to keep up with him. You’ll see.”
The next two hours were the most harrowing Alex had endured since the accident that killed Payton and crushed her leg. The minute she followed Frisco out of the yard and onto the open range, she lost control of the galloping mules and could only hang on for dear life. The mules sighted on Frisco’s horse, and the race began. Alex braced her leg against the wagon’s front fender, clutched the reins, and prayed she wouldn’t fly out of the seat. The din of pounding hooves and rattling utensils crashed in her ears, she bounced around the seat like dice in a cup, dust plumed around her, and she was absolutely and completely terrified.
When Frisco finally stopped, and she managed to halt her team, she covered her face and burst into hysterical sobbing. He didn’t say anything, just leaned against the wheel, smoked, and waited her out.
“I can’t do this,” she said when she could speak. She’d lost her hat, the sleeve of her jacket had ripped loose, her leg was trembling violently from bracing against the front fender, and she was certain that she had a dozen bruises. Finding her handkerchief, she blotted her eyes and blew her nose. “That was the most horrifying ride I’ve had since… all I could think about was the accident! And Payton, and…”
Now Frisco reached up and lifted her down, handing her the crutch to lean on until he unloaded her chair. “Each one of you insists that you can’t do anything… and then you do it.”
“Not this time. Dal, please. I don’t ever want to have a ride like that again.” She turned her face toward the side of the chuck wagon because looking out at a sea of open space made her feel dizzy. Too late she realized that she’d called him by his first name. “I kept reliving that terrible moment when the carriage began to tip, and I knew it would go over.” Shuddering, she closed her eyes and felt hot tears swim up against her lids. “Then seeing Payton lying there so still, and the rain coming down in his face…”
Frisco rolled her chair up behind her. “Do you want me to tell you that you don’t have to go? Is that what you’re looking for, Alex?” he said, walking around the chair to look at her. “All right, stay at the ranch, go back East, do whatever you want. No one is forcing you to participate. That’s your choice. But if you do choose to go on this drive, then stop fighting and do what you have to do.”
She sank into the chair gratefully, taking the weight off her leg, which was still shaking. When she’d fought down the tears, she opened her eyes and stared at him. He was sitting on the ground in front of her, his wrists crossed on top of raised knees.
The accident that had ruined her life meant nothing to him. He didn’t care what she was feeling, or how hard it was to do the things he demanded. “All you care about is the money.”
He nodded after a minute. “I’m here for the same reason you are.”
A flush lit her cheeks, and she looked away from him, embarrassed that a moment of superiority had made her forget that the money drove them all. There was no choice about whether she would participate in the drive, and he knew it. Angry, she pressed her lips together and rolled forward a few feet, hating it that he would watch her crawl out of her chair and creep on the ground. “I’m going to dig a fire pit.”
“Good,” he said, leaning against the wagon and patting his pockets, looking for a cigar. “Pretend that a dozen hungry punchers will show up in about four hours.”
The soil was compacted here and heavier than it was behind the ranch house. By the time she hacked out the sod, she was sweating and her arms ached. But she had a fire pit. Turning to tell him, she realized her position on the ground gave her a good view of the hammock beneath the wagon, the cooney, they called it. A gasp caught in her throat.
“The wood is gone!” The wild ride across the range must have jolted out the supply of kindling and firewood and left it scattered behind them. Her mind went blank, and she couldn’t conceive how it would be possible to build a fire.
Frisco lifted down a sack and a stick with a nail exposed at the end. Alex had noticed this peculiar tool before and hadn’t a notion what it was or how it might be used.
“You aren’t the first cook to find himself without firewood.” He dropped the sack in her lap and handed her the stick with the nail. “So, you build a fire with prairie coal.”
“And what might that be?”
“Cow pies. The drier the better.” When her mouth dropped open, he smiled. “No, the food won’t taste like manure, unless you drop some of it inside your pots.”
She understood at once. He expected her to roll out onto
the range, hook up dried manure, and collect it in the sack. A shudder ran down her spine. After today, she would have no pride.
Hands shaking on the wheels of her chair, she blinked hard and rolled away from the wagon. This was the worst. She had no farther to fall; she had hit bottom.
“Well, Payton. If you were seeking revenge,” she whispered, glancing toward the high thin haze floating below heaven, “today you have it.”
Expressionless, scarcely aware of the tears slipping down her cheeks, she stabbed a powdery circle of manure with the nail, then scraped it into the sack on her lap.
Chapter 8
It was a sullen group that assembled in the ranch house parlor the evening before the drive began. Freddy stood near the doorway with Grady and two of Frisco’s top hands. There were nine drovers in the room, all lean, iron-muscled men with weathered faces and work-hardened hands. They studied Freddy, Alex, and Les with sidelong glances and with the same curiosity and doubt as she focused on Frisco and Lola, who sat at the front of the room.
As much as she disliked Ward Hamm, who leaned next to Les on the sofa, his store was a gathering place for the town gossips. The tidbit that he’d passed on to Les was alarming, Freddy thought, looking slowly from Frisco’s face to Lola’s smirk. She didn’t know what to make of Ward’s information, but she intended to find out before the herd headed north tomorrow.
Skipping her gaze over Luther Moreland and his ubiquitous lapful of papers, she finally let herself glance at Jack Caldwell. He had been trying to catch her eye, but she had carefully avoided him until she was certain his attention was elsewhere. Tonight he was resplendent in striped trousers, a crimson-brocade vest, and snowy cravat. The contrast between Jack and Dal Frisco was stark. Dal wore work pants tucked into high riding boots, a faded grey shirt, and a worn leather vest. Yet Frisco was the man her gaze continually returned to.
There was no mistaking who wielded the authority at this meeting. Frisco effortlessly controlled the room though he hadn’t spoken other than to greet everyone as they arrived. When he rolled back his shoulders and hooked his thumbs in his back pockets, everyone fell silent and looked toward the front of the room.
“I want everyone in their places at sunup. Caleb, you’ll ride pilot,” he said to Caleb Webster, and Freddy leaned forward to examine a tall man with pleasant features. “Alex, you’ll follow Caleb with the chuck wagon, and Grady will be right behind you with the remuda.” Next he spoke to the punchers, assigning them swing or flank positions before he considered Freddy and Les. “You two will ride drag, and I’ll check on you when I can.”
“What is drag?” Freddy asked. Heat rose in her cheeks as she saw the drovers shift uneasily, and Lola and Jack exchanged an amused smirk. So far Lola had not addressed a single word to her stepdaughters, which was fine with Freddy. She hoped the woman choked on the cup of punch she held in her lap.
“Drag is the tail end of the herd. Your job is to keep the stragglers moving.” Now Frisco glanced at Luther and swept cold eyes across Jack Caldwell. “I understand you two will share a wagon and Mr. Hamm will drive his own rig.” Frisco focused on Jack. “The rule is, no gambling and no liquor on this drive.”
Jack leaned back in his chair. “I’ve never seen any harm in a friendly game.”
“And I’ve never seen a friendly game,” Frisco said. “Break the rule, and you’re gone. Mrs. Roark will have to appoint another representative.” Now his steady eyes settled on Ward. “The same applies to you. With the added promise that if you interfere with the herd or with my drovers in any way, you’re out. You observe, and that’s all.”
Ward puffed himself up and scowled. “Naturally I expect to spend time with my fiancée.”
“If she has the energy to socialize after her work is finished, I have no objection. But if her work suffers, I’ll warn her. If I have to warn her twice, you’re both out. Is that understood?”
Red-faced and embarrassed, Les nodded. Ward just stared with resentment.
“Everyone here is familiar with Joe Roark’s will. We’re starting this drive with two thousand, two hundred and twelve steers. I wish the brush poppers could have found us more wild beeves because we’re not allowed to purchase replacements for any we lose along the way. A ten percent margin isn’t comfortable, but that’s what we have to work with.”
Grady stepped forward. “Can we keep any strays that wander into our herd?”
“That wouldn’t be fair, Mr. Cole, now would it?” Lola waved a finger at Grady like he’d been a naughty boy, the gesture enough to make Freddy gag.
“Luther? We need a ruling on this issue.” Frisco waited for Luther to refer to Joe’s will.
“There’s no proviso against accepting strays into the herd,” Luther said finally.
Lola dug her elbow into Jack’s ribs, and he sat up straight. “As Mrs. Roark’s representative, I object. What’s to prevent Frisco or his men from collecting strays all along the trail? That’s cheating.” Lola nodded vigorous agreement.
“If we pick up ten strays along the way, that’s about five more than I’d normally expect,” Frisco said.
Luther spoke earnestly to Lola and Jack. “The only prohibition is against the Roark sisters buying more cattle than they start with.”
Lola didn’t take the decision well. She flounced her curls and pushed her lips into a pout.
Frisco let his gaze rest briefly on the faces of those who would participate in the drive. “While I acknowledge Mrs. Roark’s interest in the drive’s outcome, let me remind you that everyone in this outfit works for the Roark sisters. The Roark sisters hired us to get two thousand beeves to Abilene, and that’s what we’re going to do. I don’t have to tell you boys that we’ll lose a few along the way, and you know what our margin is. So treat each of those steers like he’s the one that will make the difference between success or failure.” Rocking back on his heels, he gazed hard at each of his drovers as if he were confirming his choices. “That’s it. Before I ride back to town, I want to speak to Les, Alex, and then Freddy. Les? Shall we step outside?”
Ward jumped up when Les did and started toward the door. Frisco leaned in to him, almost nose to nose. “None of my drovers comes with a partner attached at the hip, and that includes Les. I want to talk to her. Not you.”
Freddy stepped forward, extending a cup and enjoying Ward’s purple-faced anger. “More punch?” she asked sweetly. If he called her sister, she planned to throw it on him.
Glad to escape the crowded, overheated room, Les paused and inhaled a long breath of crisp night air before she followed Mr. Frisco down the porch steps.
“I assure you that Mr. Hamm won’t interfere,” she said in an anxious voice, struggling against an urge to apologize for Ward. “He’s as interested in our success as we are.”
Frisco led her to the fence separating the house from the outbuildings and leaned his arms on the top rail, gazing toward the barn’s dark silhouette. “You’ve come a long way and you’ve learned a lot. But it takes years to make a cowboy, not a few weeks. You’ve never seen a stampede, haven’t swum a herd.” Taking off his hat, he pushed a hand through his hair. “There’s a lot you’ll have to learn on the trail, that can’t be helped. The last time I took a herd north, two men died, Les. It’s a dangerous undertaking even for seasoned hands, which you aren’t.” Now he turned his head to gaze at her pale face. “If you have any misgivings, let’s hear them right now.”
“Every day I tell myself that I can’t do this. And frankly, I’m scared to death,” she whispered, pulling pieces of splintered wood off of the fence rail. “But I don’t have a choice.”
His gaze moved along the bruise on her jaw, then dropped to the dark mark around her wrist. “Learning has been harder on you physically than the others, and that worries me. Do you consider yourself prone to accidents?”
The question astonished her until she realized that was how he accounted for the extra bruising that showed up on her face and wrists. “I guess I am,” sh
e answered carefully.
He sighed and nodded, then straightened and looked down at her. “Keep practicing the basics. And Les… try to hold the socializing to a minimum. A tired cowboy is dangerous to himself and everyone else.”
When she reported the conversation to Ward before he climbed in his gig, he slapped a fist in his palm and swore. “Already he’s trying to keep us apart. Well, it won’t work.” He looked at her. “Aren’t you going to wish me good luck?” he asked, one hand on the fender of the gig. “I’ve sold the store, and I’ve rearranged my life. I’m making this sacrifice for us, and it isn’t easy.”
“At least you don’t have to herd longhorns,” she said lightly, suppressing a sigh.
“Is that a criticism?” His eyes narrowed into a look she knew only too well.
“No,” she said hastily, placing a hand on his chest. “I just meant that a cattle drive doesn’t sound easy for anyone involved. That’s all. I know how hard this will be for you.”
And it would be, she reminded herself. Hunched over the seat of a wagon all day would be terribly uncomfortable and lonely. He and Luther and Mr. Caldwell had agreed to share a camp near the main outfit’s site, but a man like Ward would never spend a minute in conversation with a low character like Jack Caldwell if he didn’t have to, and he considered Luther the most boring individual in Klees. He would need her company after the sun sank.
“Well,” he said, stepping into the gig and reaching for the reins, “tomorrow our destiny begins.” Occasionally he made grand statements like this one, and it always made her uncomfortable. “I hope the drive is successful. I’ll hold you responsible if it isn’t.”
He tossed out the last remark in a light voice as if he were joshing her. But Les suspected he meant it. Twisting her hands against her waist and chewing her bottom lip, she watched the road until the darkness swallowed his gig.
Slowly, she returned to the house, anticipating her last night in a real bed for a very long while. With all her heart she dreaded tomorrow.
The Best Man Page 10