by Martha Hix
“I did. They don’t. Massa Petry says he put up the traveling money. Mrs. St. Clair fell on hard times after Biloxi, and Miss St. Clair doesn’t have two nickels to rub together.”
“She’s got the ranch.”
“It’s probably all run down and grown over.”
Brax shook his head. “You know better than that. You heard Titus say he left his foreman to take care of the place. Oren Singleterry will have it in fine fettle.”
“Bubba, forget it.”
“No way.” Arms akimbo, he boomed, “My brilliant pal, thank you for pointing out how I can get the law on my side. Thank you very much. I aim to get us the Nickel Dime.”
If some oily swain beat him to the tinhorn bride, Brax might never get that ranch—much less a grubstake for California or his revenge upon the ghost of Major Titus St. Clair.
“Geoff, find out how much it’ll cost to send Bella by ship to San Francisco. Then fetch Virgil. Tell that fop of a mouthpiece to sashay on over here.”
Mr. Reluctance did not hop to attention.
“So this is the way it is, eh?” Brax dug a gold piece from his pocket. “Let’s flip for it.”
“Nawsir. Not on your life. I know about that trick coin. The only luck it’ll bring is yours.”
“My luck is yours.” Brax returned the coin to its place. “Be warned, Geoffrey Hale. I will get my money. You’re either with me or you’re not. What’s it going to be?”
“You won’t work me too hard, will you?”
Two
An hour after sending Geoff on his unmerry way, Brax found himself face to face with the roly-poly Virgil Petry.
The attorney shifted his weight from one new shoe to the other. “I’m not comfortable recommending you to Miss St. Clair.”
“Does this have anything to do with your failure to pay me a call in the hoosegow—of your own volition?” Brax watched Petry’s Adam’s apple go north, then south. “Whatcha got against me, Virg? I seem to recall a day in March of 1861. I’d been back from Texas a few months. I tried to save my mother’s life . . . but I saved yours instead.”
Petry removed his silk top hat to run a nervous hand on thinning hair thoroughly glazed with pomade. “You pulled me from the path of a runaway team.”
“I did. And you did what?”
“Said thank you.”
“Now, Virg, I recall a more enthusiastic response. Like, typical Virgil behavior. Crying, blubbering, slobbering gratitude. I believe I recall the words ‘hero nonpareil’ and a promise to be forever beholden. I’m collecting on the forever-beholden part. Do whatever you must to recommend me to Skylla St. Clair.”
“I-I . . . I just can’t do that.”
Brax reached through the bars to grab a fistful of Petry’s collar. Twisting it, he ground out, “By God, you can. I mean to marry the woman, and you will help me.”
His face grown purple from lack of oxygen, the lawyer managed to nod in agreement. Brax let go of the silk cravat and starched linen. Petry fell back against the corridor wall, gasping. Enjoying the space now between him and the cell’s bars, the little man quibbled, “But I’m not at liberty to help you. I’m grateful for my life, but I’m not Miss St. Clair’s solicitor. I represent Mrs. Claudine St. Clair, her stepmother.”
Brax itched to finish choking him. “Don’t play games with me, Virgil. Your name is in the advertisement. Tell me what the heiress looks like.”
“I’ve never even met the young lady. Mrs. St. Clair and I have communicated by correspondence.”
“What’s the matter? Is the heiress illiterate?” Suspicious, Brax steadied his eyes on the lawyer. “Does Skylla St. Clair know her relative is trying to find her a workhorse?”
“She knows. Claudine wrote to save her stepdaughter the indelicacy of appearing overeager.”
That made sense. Southern belles did have their standards. What sort of Biloxi belle did she resemble? Brax decided the looks of the deed took precedence over her physical appearance, though he did hope she didn’t resemble a warthog. After all, celibacy stank.
“I want her. Get busy, Virg.”
“But you’re a Lothario, not to mention that nasty business of two weeks ago.”
“The latter being when I beat the shit out of two Blue Bellies after they laughed about Hale womenfolk dying ‘with their noses to the ground’ in the Siege of 1863.”
“I suppose you were upset over Larkin, too.”
“I’ve had three years to mourn my brother.” His death still hurt. There was little in Brax’s life to celebrate.
“And then there’s the matter of your father.”
Brax went cold. His muscles locked. Willing himself not to appear too disturbed, he said, “Ah, dear dad. Dr. John Hale, who sold the Hale holdings downriver, then abandoned his family to their own devices.”
In 1850, Elizabeth Hale and her children, along with Bella and her son, migrated up the Mississippi from Natchez, settling here. From the start, they were shunned by Vicksburgers, even the relatives they had counted on. Once Brax reached puberty, though, a goodly number of ladies sought him out. But those were bygone days. “I’m not responsible for my father’s actions.”
“Claudine is from here. Likely, she’ll know about you.”
“I’m not marrying Claudine. Get busy, Virgil. I want out of jail, quick like, so I can be on my way to Texas.”
“Well, I, well, I . . . I mean Claudine—”
“What’s the matter with you? What kind of lawyer can’t string two words together? Why are you scared of the woman?”
Petry licked his bulbous lips. “Claudine doesn’t scare me. She’s a friend of long standing. She used to be Claudine Twill. You know, the Twills of River Bend. She’s their daughter. You remember her, I’m sure.”
Brax knew some highfalutin Twills, but he didn’t recall any Claudine. One thing cleared up, though. Virgil Petry had been, or was, close with a particular Twill, closer than two dogs huddled together in the Klondike.
A wicked chuckle accompanied this thought. Brax now knew how to blackmail the weasel. “Speaking of human frailties . . .”
A quarter-hour later the lawyer was all too willing to recommend Braxton Hale to the post of prospective husband. Two days later Brax and the black Hales boarded the steamship Jackie Jo. Onward to the good life.
Gunfire banged from the cookhouse, aimed at a quartet of thieving, and now retreating, Comanches. It masked their savage whoops and the roar of Indian ponies’ hooves striking the hard dry earth. The rifle butt bruising her thin shoulder, Skylla St. Clair fired yet another futile bullet.
Suddenly the stick that held the flap-window aloft flew away from its mooring. The heavy wooden closure slammed down. It caught the rifle barrel. The butt kicked up to catch Skylla’s chin. She screeched in pain and fell hard on the earthen floor.
The events of this sweltering morning in July were enough to reduce a woman to a bucket of tears. One of the other two females in the enormous cookhouse was already so reduced, but Skylla wouldn’t let herself cry.
“It’s over.” She got to unsteady feet, brushed the skirt of her widow’s weeds, and forced a smile at her fearless adopted sister, who blew on the pistol barrel she’d leveled at the marauders. Skylla walked to the whiskey still, then lent a hand to her cowering stepmother. “You can quit crying. Stalking Wolf is gone.” For now. “We’ll be okay.”
“Will we?” Claudine lifted trembling fingers to her thick red hair. “That evil Indian and his awful band are stealing us blind. I told you, you should’ve let me at the Spencer.”
Skylla wouldn’t point out that her stepmother could barely hit a grazing longhorn, not to mention Claudine’s debilitating fear at the first sign of Indian attack. While Skylla, too, had been tempted to hide, and while her aim was nothing to brag about, she’d never entertained the idea of handing the rifle to Claudine.
Kathy Ann lowered the pistol. “I nicked an Injun.”
“Better you had killed him,” Claudine said.
“Better he didn’t kill me.” The fifteen-year-old’s gaze cruised over the cupboards. “What’s for breakfast?”
Claudine’s face went as red as her hair. “Is that all you can think of! You’re already big as a moose. God, what was I doing when I allowed my late husband Mr. Lewis to adopt his misbegotten! You are too dreadful for words.”
“Claudi—don’t.” Skylla turned to her stepsister. Tears welled in the girl’s eyes. “Lovey, she doesn’t mean it.”
Kathy Ann rushed from the cookhouse.
“Claudi, try to be more prudent with your words.” Skylla had learned to be cautious with hers.
The redhead chewed the bottom lip of her Cupid’s bow mouth. “Every mother wants her child to behave. She would try the patience of a saint.”
“All she asked for is something to eat. We all get hungry.” Forcing the accusation from her tone, Skylla said, “Kathy Ann was your third husband’s daughter, and you did agree to adopt her.”
“She’s had half her life to recover from the upbringing of that prostitute mother of hers. You’d think she would’ve straightened up by now.”
“If you wouldn’t be harsh with her, she might respond.”
“You’ve never been harsh, and what good has it done?”
This was no time to extend the debate over childrearing. Skylla stared at the door Kathy Ann had exited, and thought about what else awaited outside. “I’ll cook her a special treat for lunch. That should make her feel better. For now, though, we’d best survey Stalking Wolf’s damages.”
Leaving the cookhouse and glimpsing her late uncle’s two-story granite home, Skylla felt older than her twenty-three years. A rope dangled from a rung of the porch railing. The Comanches had stolen the piglet that had been tied there. A quick look at the henhouse yard gave evidence that the chickens were also gone.
Skylla feared Stalking Wolf was on the verge of stealing her dream—making something of her legacy.
As had the foreman who’d made off with the ranch’s string of horses not long before the three St. Clair women arrived in late January, Stalking Wolf undermined Skylla’s efforts to get the ranch on its feet.
The Nickel Dime had once been a prosperous spread. Uncle Titus had made a fortune herding cattle to the market in New Orleans. As well, he’d gotten a king’s ransom in gemstones from the creek, only to lose them to thieving Comanches. That was before he’d left for the war, taking the cream of his cowboys with him and impressing friends and acquaintances along the route to Virginia into Confederate service.
Her eccentric uncle had then perished at Second Manassas, a battle Northerners called Second Bull Run.
His fortune gone, he left a ranch stocked with unbranded longhorn cattle. Skylla knew nothing about prospecting for topaz, nor did she have the reference books necessary to learn the skill, and she was ignorant about longhorns. Not that there was any local market for them, anyway. Even seeking to hire help had been a lesson in frustration and aggravation.
She took note of the positives. “The Comanches didn’t trample my garden this time,” she said to Claudine, who lagged behind. “And we’ve still got a horse.”
“Monroe is on his last legs.”
“He’s better than nothing.”
“Always the optimist, that’s my daughter and best friend.”
They were best friends, and had been for a decade before Ambrose St. Clair had married the widowed Claudine in 1860. Best friends, mother and daughter, business partners, inept frontierswomen—their bonds were strong.
Claudine caught up, took Skylla’s hand. “Daisy,” she said, using the pet name she’d bestowed on her at their first meeting, “let’s sit for a spell. There’s something I need to tell you.”
The two women made their way to a picnic table under a spreading oak near the house, Skylla’s gait the slower of the two. Seated, Skylla took off her bonnet to brush a wayward lock of dark hair out of her face. “What’s wrong, Claudi?”
“I’ve done something,” the alluring redhead admitted, her eyes on the flask she kept on the table. “You may not approve.”
Skylla picked up the cold cup of coffee. She’d abandoned it upon hearing the arrival of marauding Comanches. “Go on.”
“We need help with this awful ranch.”
“Please don’t say ‘awful.’ The Nickel Dime is our only hope.” Skylla had inherited the place upon her uncle’s death. Having been stranded by war, only recently had she been able to claim it. Never again would she, or her kin, be homeless. “This ranch is our promise for the future.”
“It could be. With the proper help.”
“Uncle’s cowboys will return to help us,” Skylla said, ever hopeful.
“A pipe dream.” Claudine poured a snifter of whiskey—part of the small stash she’d found in the cookhouse last January. But she set the glass down with deliberate purpose. “I’ve come to the conclusion that a woman in Texas, even if she scrapes the bottom of a barrel, can’t come up with a fine and decent man.”
“Unless she can tame an Indian brave,” Skylla joked, hoping to scare the redhead off her favorite subject. The lack of suitable men hereabouts.
“Tame an Indian? We’re lucky they haven’t scalped us.”
“If they were after our scalps, they’d have taken them by now,” Skylla replied with bravado. “You know, some people even say the Comanches can be good people.”
“Forget Indians.” The widow fiddled with the neckline of her faded gingham dress. “I have a plan to solve our dilemma. I’ve sent for a mail-order husband.”
Mail-order husband?
Claudine desperate enough to seek out a husband? Insanity. Pure insanity. Claudine was the loveliest blossom in the Magnolia State not so long ago. She’d had her choice of suitors each time she’d wed, and when she’d married Ambrose St. Clair, he’d been hailed by Jeff Davis himself as the luckiest man in Mississippi. Claudine had a knack with men.
But gentility and appreciative beaux were no more. On the Texas frontier, no admirers came courting, not to the most divine widow, never to a spinsterly and scarred brunette.
Yet Skylla didn’t seek a husband. Her heart still beat for a dashing young ensign who’d given his life in service to the Confederate Navy.
“Go on,” Skylla urged, swallowing her sorrow. “What have you done to get a husband?”
“I’ve written to the Twill family attorney. I asked Virgil Petry to advertise for decent men.”
Skylla took a sip of coffee. “Men?”
“Dearest, Virgil is procuring husbands for us both.”
The cup slipped from Skylla’s fingers.
All day, all night, Skylla scrambled for an alternative to the mail-order husbands. At first light she rode into Ecru. Her best shot? Selling her mother’s string of pearls, the proceeds of which would be earmarked for another go at finding and hiring decent cowboys. No one had money to buy pearls.
Charlie Main did offer his dubious services in exchange for all the whiskey he could guzzle. (A talented jewel-cutter, Titus had also possessed skill at the distiller’s art, and false rumor had it he’d left a bountiful legacy.) Skylla declined the filthy sot’s offer.
The grocer, Emil Kreitz, agreed to take the pearls in trade for a sack of flour, a bushel of potatoes, and a box of bullets. He even threw in a dozen sticks of horehound candy—a true delicacy in these times—for Kathy Ann.
It took two more days of soul-searching before Skylla gave up. She went to Claudine. Bent over the writing desk in her second-floor bedroom, the redhead set her pen down.
“You win, Claudi. I won’t fight you over the husbands.”
“Thank heavens.” Claudine quit the chair. “I’ll post a letter to Virgil Petry, and remind him to be exacting and discriminating. I insist on the best of men for the two of us.”
“One should hope.”
Reaching to open a desk drawer, Claudine extracted a long envelope, then pulled papers from it. “From Virgil. It has to do with legalities. We must discus
s them before we tie ourselves legally to anyone.”
Skylla read six pages of flowery script, one a dummy deed of trust. Marrying could have its repercussions, if the St. Clairs weren’t careful. Thankfully, Solicitor Petry was a master at his craft.
“Where’s my cat?”
The ladies swiveled around to face the insolent Kathy Ann.
Claudine gritted her teeth. “You’re supposed to be confined to your room, young lady.”
Earlier, the girl had charged from the house when Claudine had insisted she couldn’t have all the horehound candy at once. Kathy Ann had stayed away for hours, scaring Skylla half to death, for she’d feared the Indians had gotten her sister.
“Where’s my cat?”
“Lovey.” Skylla spoke gently, moving across the room to put her arm around corpulent hunched shoulders. “I thought you were going to hem the hand towels. We do need them so, and your handwork is the most delicate I’ve ever seen.”
Kathy Ann jerked free. “Where’s my cat?”
“I put Electra outside, where she will stay,” Claudine snapped, her fingers twitching, as if they tingled to cane the girl. “And you know why.”
“I wish you’d left me in New Orleans.” Kathy Ann whirled around, stomping away and rushing down the stairs.
Skylla wilted onto the edge of the bed, closed her eyes, and dropped her chin. “Oh, Claudi, let’s pray our husbands will guide Kathy Ann with more sense and sensibility than we’ve used.”
“Let us pray.”
Three weeks after collaring Virgil Petry, Brax and company sailed into the Texas port of Indianola. He arrived filled with vim, vigor, enthusiasm. Get to the Nickel Dime, get it sold, get gone. Piece of cake. In between? Three hot meals, a feather bed, and a dutiful wife to tumble in that feather bed.
How simple the future seemed as he and Geoff disembarked the Jackie Jo, then waved goodbye to Bella, watching as she sailed away, bound for San Francisco around the Horn. Then . . .