Oysters came through the rear door, halting abruptly at the sight of Cynara. Noticing, Barclay said, “Did you meet Mrs. Stratton last night, Oysters?"
"No. I stayed in the kitchen."
"And I stayed in with the babies," Cynara said. "Glad to meet you, Oysters."
"How-do, ma'am?"
"Very well, thank you." He seemed an odd fellow, but she liked him, probably because he was different.
"I'll get your breakfast for you." He fetched a plate from the back of the stove, took off the cloth covering and set it in front of her. "I hope it's not cold."
"I'm sure it will be fine," she said, picking up her fork. "Thank you, Oysters, and call me Cynara, please."
The grizzled cook nodded. "Yes, ma'am."
Barclay claimed a chair. "We'll let you eat in peace for a bit before we discuss naming the babies."
"It won't bother me to talk while I eat. The biscuits look wonderful."
Oysters grinned. "Thank ye."
She scooped up some potatoes covered with flour gravy. "Barclay said you'd want to pick a name for the baby you're in charge of," she said to the younger brothers.
"Hell… I mean, heck. Sorry, ma'am." Chase's face flushed. "I haven't a notion what to name my little girl."
Barclay stifled a chuckle. He liked hearing his youngest brother say, "my little girl". It sounded domestic, the very opposite of Chase. Barclay hoped it meant the boy intended to take his responsibility seriously.
"You don't have any favorite names?" Cynara buttered a biscuit. "Maybe a girlfriend's name or a cousin's?"
"We don't have any cousins." Jared sipped his coffee. "At least none we know. There must be some back in Illinois."
"Is that where you're from originally?" Cynara asked.
"Our parents migrated west after they married," Barclay said. "We boys were born here on the ranch.
Cynara cut into her beefsteak. "Where are your parents now?"
"Pa died over a year ago of apoplexy." Barclay watched her struggle to cut the meat with a butter knife and handed her a sharper one. "Ma wanted to live in town where she could visit friends, attend church and go to social functions, so we bought her a little house."
She nodded her thanks for the utensil. "I see. Chase, what about the name, Elizabeth?"
Chase made a face. "Too common. There must be a million women with that name. I'd prefer something pretty but unusual. You know, like a flower. Not Daisy though. I don't care for Daisy."
"What about Lily or Amaryllis?" Cynara asked.
Chase perked up. "Amaryllis is pretty. Kind of a mouthful, though, for such a tiny mite."
"Then go with Lily or Mary." Barclay refilled his coffee and, while he was up, fetched a glass of water for Cynara. They were going to have to beef up their manners with her around. She deserved to be treated like the lady she was.
"No." Chase shook his head. "Those names remind me of the girls at the—"
Barclay cleared his throat. When his little brother glanced at him, he shook his head. Chase should know better than to mention whores in front of a lady. "I'm going to name my little guy Connor, after Mother's father. Always considered that a nice name."
"Very good. We're getting somewhere." Cynara smiled and even though it lacked humor, Barclay loved seeing it. He felt a curious urge to kiss her. Dang. Where had that come from? He'd better get his libido on the right track. He had a few years yet before he could even consider courting a woman. Getting the ranch in the black and proving he could successfully run the place came first.
"I'll call my boy Gage," Jared said. "Short and simple, after our oldest brother."
Typical of Jared. He was always saying that—short and simple—then he'd turn around and be picky as an old lady about how chores were done. Thorough and efficient; that was Jared. But to honor their brother Gage was typical of Jared too. He had always favored Gage. So much so Barclay had always worried Jared would run away too and leave the family to wonder where he was, if he was dead or alive, the way Gage had done.
"You have another brother?" Cynara asked.
Jared chuckled. "We have a brother and two sisters you haven't met. Gage, Charissa and Dena."
"Oh, my. I didn't know."
"Gage left a long time ago," Barclay said. "We don't know where he is. Charissa is twenty. She teaches school in Helena and lives with an aunt. Dena is in school in Chicago."
"She'll be home soon, though," Jared added. "You'll get along with her real well."
Cynara's gaze darted away and she looked uncertain. Would she still be here when Dena came home? Barclay hoped so. "Chase. I thought maybe you could name the girl after Ma's mother, Mercy."
He laughed. "That's a terrible name. No girl would want to be named Mercy."
"What about Iris? Poppy?" Cynara asked. "Or Aster? Those are pretty names."
"Iris is kind of nice." He glanced at his brother. "A lot better than Rose, which is what I expected Jared to come up with."
Jared stared at him. "Now, what's wrong with Rose? It's a pretty name."
Chase crossed his arms over his chest, a sign that he was about to get stubborn. "No, thanks."
"I've always liked Marigold," Cynara said. "You could call her Mary or Goldie for short."
"I don't like nicknames, especially Mary," Chase said. "But I like Marigold. Kinda matches the color of her hair."
"You saying that baby has orange hair?" Jared asked.
"Her hair does have a reddish tinge," Cynara said.
Barclay appreciated her trying to avoid a fight. "Some marigolds are yellowish. Or golden. How about Peony, Violet?"
Chase straightened. "Violet's pretty."
"Why don't you name her after Pa's mother?" Jared asked. "Her name was Vella. I always figured if I had a daughter someday, I'd give her Grandma's name."
"Vella." Chase sounded it out as if tasting it. "I like that a lot."
"Very good," Cynara said. "We have names for all three babies. Connor, Gage and Vella. It will be a relief not to have to keep calling them Boy One, Boy Two and Girl."
Barclay laughed, causing her to look at him with surprise in her hazel eyes. Hazel. He hadn't noticed before. Fact was, he rarely noticed anyone's eye color. Hers reminded him of a forest meadow, all green with hints of brown. Why had she seemed surprised to hear him laugh? Thinking back, he guessed there hadn't been much occasion for jocularity since she arrived. Minnie had put an end to the usual cheerfulness of the household.
"You finished, ma'am?" Oysters asked. "I can get that out of your way."
"Oh, yes." She handed him her plate, the utensils on top. "Thank you."
"I'll be leaving for town as soon as Cynara can write me up a list," Barclay said.
She glanced around, probably for a piece of paper. Barclay yanked out a drawer in the sideboard and, taking out paper and a pencil, he handed them to her. She went to work immediately, her head bent over the list. The first thing she wrote was mail.
Chase stood. "I have to go check on that fence I left Bobby Boy to finish."
At Cynara's look of curiosity, Barclay explained, "Bobby Boy is one of the hands. Oysters stuck him with that moniker the first day he came here."
"Bobby because his name is Robert?" she asked.
"No," Oysters said. "His name’s Glendennon Ferguson."
Looking confused, she said, "But… Why Bobby?"
"Every boy deserves a good American name," Oysters replied. "Something folks can pronounce and remember.”
"Oh." She blinked, gave her head a slight shake and returned her attention to her list. Chase headed for the back door.
Barclay halted him. "Chase? Your chair?"
Scowling and muttering under his breath, Chase returned and pushed his chair under the table, a rule their mother had enforced, but the youngest Givens brother always seemed to forget.
Barclay took his hat from the wall-rack. "I'll be outside hitching up the buckboard."
"I'll find you when I finish this," Cynara said, adding a
nother item to her list.
All the way into town, Barclay kept an eye out for any sign of Minnie. It still amazed him she'd been able to leave the way she had, with no apparent concern for her babies. She'd taken the fifty dollars of his, as well as a bottle of laudanum he'd had on his dresser. Doc had given it to him for headaches last spring when he was battling for water rights with Beauford Hodson who owned the spread next to High Mountain. Thank heaven that ended satisfactorily.
Before his death, George Givens had been friends with Beau, but after George's death, all traces of friendship vanished. It soon became apparent Beau wanted High Mountain added to his own holdings.
Barclay found the usual street traffic in Cutthroat. He waved to several friends as he maneuvered the buckboard up the road to the general store. With a population of only five hundred, stores weren't abundant. Jeffers' General Store met most needs. The majority of businesses served alcohol and, sometimes, women. Luckily, he managed to claim a good place out front to park and load his goods.
Half a dozen townsfolk and a few strangers milled about inside, clogging the aisles and jabbering. Tom Jeffers' waved and Barclay returned the salute.
"Howdy, Tom," he said when he reached the counter at the back of the store. He never could figure out why anyone would put their counter at the rear when it made it easier for thieves to get away with goods out the front door. But it was Tom's store.
"Barclay. How is it out at High Mountain? The ranch doing okay?" Jeffers brushed a finger over his mustache as he spoke. The man was right proud of that row of hair.
"Doing fine, Tom." He debated how much to tell him about the special needs that had brought him to town. "Right now, we have a guest staying with us."
"Barclay!" Boots McKinney appeared beside him, so close they could almost rub noses.
Barclay stepped back. He'd never cared for the man. Boots had shown up, skinny as a rail, about a year ago and managed to get Beau Hodson to hire him at the Double Z. Barclay figured Boots fit in with Hodson's bunch perfectly. All were hell raisers. "Hello, Boots."
"I hear tell you boys got a little surprise out to your place. Or should I say three surprises, eh?" Boots evidently found that quite humorous. Barclay felt certain the man's bellow of laughter had reached clear outside. "And the mother skedaddled?"
Appalled at the man's loud tone and how much he knew, Barclay scanned the store to see who else might be listening. A stranger at the far end of the counter examining a pocketknife stared back at him. The customer quickly returned his attention to the knife, but Barclay feared he'd heard everything. When he returned to the ranch, he'd drill his men to learn who'd opened his dang mouth. Unable to deny Boots' words, he ignored them instead. "How are you, Boots? Things going well out at the Double Z?"
"Fine. Fine. Just came in for a can of peaches while I'm waiting for the blacksmith to finish fixing a wheel." He set a can on the counter.
With a jerk of his head, Barclay signaled Tom to take care of Boots first and waited to finish his own business until after the gasbag left. Boots gossiped more than the church biddies on Sunday morning. No way would Barclay tell him anything.
"Now," Tom said, once McKinney had left, "what can I get for you, Barclay?"
He leaned closer. "Baby stuff, if you can believe it. Do you have any diapers?"
Barclay had to give the store owner his due; the man kept his surprise and curiosity in check. Barclay handed him Cynara's list.
"Can't get diapers ready-made." Tom glanced it over. "I'll cut some flannel for you."
"Thanks," Barclay said, looking at some tobacco.
While the proprietor measured the fabric, his wife helped gather the smaller items on the list. Leaning close, Barclay said, "Beth, what do you know about the recent goings-on at the ranch?"
She cast a furtive look around and whispered, "You know how news gets around a small town. It's a shocking story. How can I help you today, Barclay?"
"Cynara doesn't seem to have anything other than the clothes on her back. You're a woman. You know what kind of basics she needs. Add them to the pile but discreetly. All right?"
"Bless you, Barclay. This is very kind of you and generous too. One thing I think she'd want most is black fabric for a dress to honor her dead husband and child. Everything she owned burned when they set fire to the house to keep the smallpox contained."
He nodded. "Of course. Add whatever she'll need for sewing it and any personal items you think she could use like a comb or brush. Maybe a couple of ribbons for her hair? Whatever you think. We owe her a great deal for what she's doing for us. I want to pay her back however I can."
"How sweet,” Beth gushed. “You've always been one of the more thoughtful young men in town. No doubt part of the reason so many of our single girls have taken a shine to you, other than your good looks."
“You’re embarrassing me, Beth.”
“Sorry. By the way—” She lowered her voice. “—your mother was in here earlier same time as Amy and overheard the talk. She didn't say anything—you know her—but I could tell she was hurt you hadn't been over to tell her yourself. I imagine the storm kept her in town last night, and it's still muddy as a hog wallow out. Otherwise, she'd likely have been out there first thing this morning."
"I'm sure you're right. I'll go see Ma before I leave town. I appreciate you letting me know about Ma being upset." He watched her store the last of the smaller supplies in a crate. When she reached for the box that held the dresser set, he said, "Why don't you wrap Cynara's things separate from the household goods. No need for everybody to see them."
Beth nodded and went to work. After loading everything in the wagon, Barclay drove to the far end of town. He parked in front of the small, tidy white house his mother now occupied and jumped down. Before he made it to the porch, she burst from the house.
"Barclay! It's about time you came. What is this I hear everyone palavering about? Babies and disappearing mothers? What have you been up to? And who's the father?" Her voice grew sterner with each sentence.
He held up his hands. "I haven't been up to anything, Ma, and I'm not the father. Neither is Jared or Chase. The mother simply showed up at the house in labor and we took her in. She was only fifteen and I suspect she'd been raped."
"Oh, that poor girl." Julia Givens ushered her son into the house and sat him at the table while she poured coffee. "Barclay, son, I'm so glad to see you. I was going to go down to the livery to arrange for a buggy tomorrow morning. I was even going to bring popcorn balls."
Barclay and his brothers loved the corn his mother popped, poured boiling syrup over and formed into balls. It was a common treat at parties and festivals, but Julia liked it so much she made it almost anytime company came. Doc blamed it for Ma's bad teeth.
"That would've been nice, Ma. You've no call to fret over us, though. Everything's fine at the ranch."
"Even so, I want to see those babies before some relative comes to claim them or the mother comes back." She shook her head. "Just can't believe she would simply go off like that and leave them."
"I think she was too young to deal with a situation of that magnitude," Barclay said. "She rode her horse over to the stage road, waited for the coach to come along and caught a ride."
"Why, that would have stopped here." Ma bustled about, fixing a quick batch of biscuits and gravy. "I haven't seen any strangers in town."
"You're at the far end, away from the depot, Ma. It's not likely you would see any strangers from here. Anyway, I doubt she would've gotten off the stage." Barclay drank his coffee. "She'd have been afraid of being seen and taken back to the ranch. I suspect she thought someone would be after her from wherever she'd been before. She seemed terrified of being found."
"Gracious, the goings-on these days. Did you hear about the bank robbery over in Pine Bluff?"
Barclay shook his head.
"Happened two weeks ago Tuesday. Marshal Henshaw got suspicious when he noticed a man with some horses watching the bank. Marsha
l rounded up his deputies and caught them when they came out of the bank. Trial was yesterday. They'll be toted off to the prison any day now. You think this girl might have had something to do with that gang?"
"Don't know, Ma. Anything's possible. Don't go to a lot of trouble with the vittles. I need to get back to the ranch. Cynara's going to be needing more diapers. Those little tykes go through them the way a lamp gobbles kerosene."
"Poor things." Ma lifted the hot skillet off the stove, brought it to the table and began pouring gravy over the biscuits on his plate. "You eat up. Need your strength to deal with all you have on those big shoulders of yours."
"Thanks, Ma." He forced himself to eat as much as he could, even though he wasn't hungry. He knew better than to refuse food from his mother. "I'd better get back."
Standing, he hugged her.
"I'll come out real soon, son," Ma said. "I'd go back with you right now if it wasn't tatting day. I'm in the middle of teaching some of the younger women. But I'll get out there soon. Probably tomorrow."
"You do that, Ma. I'm sure Cynara would appreciate the help and some female company."
He hugged his mother, who fussed over a loose button on his shirt. He barely escaped getting stripped so she could secure the button better. As he climbed aboard the wagon, the stranger he'd seen earlier in the store strolled up to him.
"Hello. You Barclay Givens?"
"Yes. Who's asking?"
The man, a tall ordinary looking fellow in his twenties, with straight, white teeth and shiny brown hair, removed his hat and held out a hand. "Name's Dirk Shindler. Worked at the Crooked J Spread east of the Big Horns until the old man died and the son decided to look for a buyer. Heard you might have room in your bullpen for another man."
Barclay studied him. He was presentable and muscular enough to indicate he worked hard. He also looked Barclay straight in the eye. His pa always considered that a sign of forthrightness. "Bunkhouse is kind of empty right now. Most of my men are out on the range counting steers. You willing to ride the range and wrestle steers out of mudholes?"
Barclay (Bachelors And Babies Book 4) Page 6