Mail-Order Man

by Martha Hix

  “What was that all about?” Braxton strode up.

  “The grief of a troubled man.” She lifted the box. “He brought this.” Unwrapping it, she took the gift in hand. “Oh, my goodness. It’s a cameo. She knew I’d wanted yours.”

  Skylla swallowed the lump in her throat. If only she could thank Claudine . . .

  Braxton stepped to the side, and bright lamplight spilled over the brooch. Shock and confusion then struck Skylla, and her eyes went to her husband’s ashen face. “This is . . . this is your mother’s cameo. How can that be?”

  “Skylla, we need to talk.”

  Twenty-six

  When the last guest at the Christmas feast departed, Braxton repeated his words of thirty minutes earlier. “We need to talk.”

  Skylla had spent a troubled half-hour, imagining all sorts of reasons for her husband’s lying about the cameo. How many other things had he distorted? What did she really know about this father of her child? “I’m waiting.”

  “I didn’t give you my mother’s cameo.” His handsome face was contorted. “I sold it in Menard. To finance our wedding.”

  Once, she had thrown this option out to Claudine. It was certainly the most reasonable possibility, and now it had proven truthful. “Who would have money to buy a cameo? And why did you feel the need to lie about this?” She pointed to the one he’d given her.

  “Because I sold it to a whore.”

  “What . . . what caused you to call on a whore?”

  “These are hard times. Jane was the only person with money for frippery.”

  “Jane?” Skylla echoed, not caring for his familiarity with the woman. An argument from the past arose in her mind. “Claudine mentioned the cameo, but I cut her short. She had it in her possession days before she died. No matter what Winslow Packard said, Claudine schemed against me.” No longer would she grieve for the woman who was not a friend. “She knew you’d been to a whore. She figured tangible evidence would reinforce her charges against you. They were true, weren’t they?” On his face was guilt. It hurt Skylla to press the issue, but she did. “How well do you know that whore?”

  “As well as a man can know a woman,” he replied in a hollow voice. “But, Skylla, I didn’t—”

  “No. Don’t say a word.” She wanted to pummel him, to make him hurt as she did, but fear of expressing her anger made her proceed with caution. “I need to be alone.”

  She wanted to tear something to shreds; better a pillow than a deceitful husband. But how did one deal with a deceased villainess? Raising her chin in wounded dignity, Skylla made for the darkened bedroom. Yet he wouldn’t leave her be.

  Not five minutes later, he stopped in the doorway, a dark figure against the light behind him. Gone was the frock coat. He strode toward her, lighting the lamp. His features pleaded for understanding. Seated on the bed, she fiddled with the clasp and handed the cameo to Braxton. “I’d rather not wear this.”

  He gave the brooch a tiny toss, as if it were hot in his hand, then caught it and set it on the nightstand. Taking a sidestep, he crowded her sight. She stared at her father’s stickpin and closed her left hand, letting her nails dig into the palm. “Why did you to go to a whore when we were engaged?”

  Braxton hunkered down, getting eye to eye. “I didn’t sleep with her.”

  It took Skylla’s store of patience not to tear him limb from limb. “I should imagine you did little sleeping.” Her gaze went to the masculine part of him so evident against the material of his trousers. “Where has that thing of yours been?”

  The crook of his finger raised her chin. “I swear I haven’t touched her since before the war.” Her teeth ground together as he persisted. “I swear to God I haven’t.”

  How could she believe a hot-blooded man hadn’t taken care of his needs? She shoved the hand away that he tried to place on her cheek. “Don’t make me say things I’ll regret later. Leave me be. I want to be alone tonight.”

  “Where shall I go? Perhaps the pigsty, so I can be with the other swine?” He rose to stand. “I won’t be turned out because I made your wedding special, while you hoarded a king’s ransom.”

  “Hoarded a king’s ransom? You weren’t on the premises when Kathy Ann discovered the treasure,” Skylla said, marshaling an even tone. “I find it very difficult to like you right now.”

  “Same goes for you, cupcake.” He didn’t bother with the door as he stomped away. The front door did close with a slam.

  She went to the parlor and let her temper go, picking up item after item to toss at the doorway. “Damn you, Braxton Hale! Damn you for a liar and a whoremonger!”

  Somehow she got undressed and into bed. Her bladder warned her about not taking care of necessities, but she told it to leave her alone. Some time later, arguments from the heart intruded on her anger. He’d said he wanted to make their wedding special. He’d sworn his hands hadn’t lately touched that whore. But why did he have to go to such a woman to sell the cameo? Simple. Like he’d said, who else could afford a bauble?

  “I’m not going to make excuses,” Skylla muttered and got out of bed, unable to deny her screaming bladder.

  The chamber pot stood ready, but some unknown something propelled her to the outhouse. On the trip there, as well as on the return, her eyes scoured the surroundings for her aggravating husband. He wasn’t in the pigsty.

  By the cookhouse a tepee had been erected, a couple of Indian ponies tethered next to it. Kathy Ann and family had stayed over. Skylla took comfort. She’d have her sister’s presence in the morning. As for tonight . . .

  Where was Braxton? She marched into the bedroom, then locked the door. She took up her brush and yanked the bristles through her tangles, taking solace in physical pain. When she turned to the bed, she saw Braxton. In the far corner, standing in the dim light, wearing nothing but his britches.

  Neither spoke a single syllable.

  Her blood began to heat, and it wasn’t in anger.

  He stepped into a ray of moonlight, and his tall body became limned in silver. “Forgive me. Forgive me, Skylla. ’Cause if you don’t, I’m going to lose my mind.”

  She opened her arms.

  Just before dawn, he still held her tightly, whispering tender words into her ear. Their love played sweet, gentle, for he’d cherished her with a reverence that took her breath away. Then he’d loved her with such passion that she believed an earthquake had shaken them to pieces.

  She couldn’t tell him about the baby now, not while rolling along the tremendous hills and valleys of making love. Baby news wasn’t something to blurt out.

  Way past first light, René tapped on the window. “Are you wanting breakfast?”

  Braxton jumped from bed, jerking on clothes. “This may be Christmas Day, but ranching never takes a holiday.”

  No way would she demand he neglect the Nickel Dime for their splendid news. Instead, she got presentable, then moseyed out to the cookhouse. She might have abdicated the cookstove, but her fingers weren’t yet weaned from lifting the lids on pots. Still, she grew impatient to call Braxton aside.

  She said to René, “You take over.”

  “D’accord.” His hand made a shooing motion. “You are not needing. Too many cooks spoil the soup.”

  She’d rather spoil her husband, which didn’t necessitate ruining René’s soup. The matter of the cameo was dead, as dead as Claudine, and that was that.

  Already she’d garbed herself in the trousers and shirt she’d long ago decided were the only proper clothes for ranching. Intent on saddling the dappled mare dubbed Pretty Girl, she started toward the stable.

  “Morning, Skylla.” Kathy Ann walked toward her, worry on her moon-shaped features. “Are you all right?”

  She flushed, realizing she hadn’t thought about family since that trip to the outhouse. Kissing her sister’s cheek, she said, “Did you sleep well? Did your family?”

  Kathy Ann would have none of this banality. “What did Major Albright do to upset you?”
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br />   “Nothing that Braxton and I didn’t work out.”

  “That’s obvious enough. You look like you spent the night being tumbled.”

  “Guilty! ”

  “It pleases me to see you happy.”

  “That goes double for you.” They embraced, and Skylla considered their new closeness. For years she’d given her friendship wholeheartedly to Claudine, yet Kathy Ann had become an enduring friend. She confided, “I’m on the way to break wonderful news to Braxton.”

  “That you’re pregnant?”

  “How did you know?”

  “Wild guess.” Kathy Ann winked. “Congratulations!”

  Fingers smoothed blond braids. “I’m so happy about your baby. Just think, our children will be playmates.”

  “I’m looking forward to that.” Kathy Ann spoke softly. “I know you’re in a rush to find Sarge, but before you chase off, I have something to give you.” She reached into a beaded pouch that hung from her shoulder. “We exchanged a lot of presents last night, but I held one back. Sergeant gave me this.” She placed a gold coin in her sister’s hand. “You know the night.”

  “I remember.” A warmth swirled as Skylla slipped the coin into her breast pocket. “I’ll forever cherish it. Maybe I’ll even”—she winked conspiratorially—“ save it for my firstborn to use in case of emergencies.”

  “Do that, Skylla. You do that.”

  The sisters parted, the elder one making for the stables and the gray, Pretty Girl. Soon, with the wind in her hair, Skylla was on her way to Safe Haven Canyon. Trouble met her as she topped the first rise. Winslow Packard rode toward her on a stout mount.

  The county clerk brought his big horse to heel. Pomade glistened in the sunlight as he doffed his hat. “I bring bad news,” he said without preamble. “After you paid your taxes a couple days ago, I tried to abstract the deed to this ranch.”

  Yes, she’d paid back taxes, but she couldn’t fathom what he meant about the deed. “I beg your pardon?”

  “I find no record that a title passed to Titus St. Clair.”

  “You must be mistaken. The Confederate county clerk said there was no problem with transferring the title to my name.”

  “Well, Mrs. Hale, that’s a Reb for you.”

  She clenched her teeth. “Word has been running wild here lately, Mr. Packard. You Reconstructionists are doing your best to make life uncomfortable for Southerners.” With a haughty glare, she added, “But there’s something more here, isn’t there? I believe you have some sort of ax to grind over Claudine. Why was she in your office that day?”

  He pulled a cigar from his coat, bit the end, and spat it at the ground. Next, he lit a match, cupping his hand around the flame as he ignited the stogie. Blowing smoke toward Skylla, he replied, “She asked me to destroy the deed book. I didn’t buy into her conniving ways. But she did give me pause to wonder about the legality of your claim.”

  Oh, Claudi, you didn’t! But she had. “If the deed isn’t legal, fine. My husband and I will buy the ranch.”

  “Do that, Mrs. Hale. Be at the courthouse steps on the morning of January fifteenth. That’s when the sheriff will conduct the auction.” He turned his mount around. “By the way, I’ve set the opening bid at fifty thousand dollars.”

  His crop struck his prancing mount and he galloped away.

  Winslow Packard took delight in this altercation with Claudine’s kin. That redheaded bitch had gazed upon his meager equipment with disgust, which reinforced the laughter that rang in his head. Many a whore had scorned him. But he would have the last laugh, for he had the power to break Claudine’s family.

  He eased his mount into a canter, then recalled the day Claudine had called to beg that he destroy public records. As he had told her, he wouldn’t do such a thing, and he wouldn’t have, no matter how many times she might have gone down on him.

  “Zephyr, I shouldn’t have been weak at the funeral,” he said to the stallion. “I shouldn’t have eased the family’s mind about her change of heart, her intentions to make peace.”

  Zephyr, snorting, twisted his neck to listen to his master, and Packard elaborated, “There’s no need for weakness now. There’s no deed to the Nickel Dime. I will have the place for myself. I will have what that Rebel bitch connived to get.”

  Shaking, Skylla stared as Packard faded over a hillock. He hadn’t been joking. Fifty thousand dollars! The San Antonio bank held forty thousand in the Hale account. Ten thousand short. An impossible amount. She must find the deed.

  What had transpired to transfer the ranch to her name? Her uncle’s will in hand, she’d called on the county clerk. Bernard Loez, his dark hair an unruly shock, had assured her the deed wasn’t necessary “We’ve got it on file,” he’d said. Had he been lax?

  She couldn’t solve her problems in the pasture. She rode fast for the house and hurried inside, Kathy Ann and Pansy, along with Guadalupe, behind her. Speaking hurriedly, she explained the situation to her audience. “We’ve got to turn this place upside down,” she then declared.

  Kathy Ann ordered Pansy to look under every bed, every table; they also searched the attic. Skylla conscripted Guadalupe. First off, they shoved the bed aside to lift the trapdoor. Skylla peered downward. Nothing. Nothing but dark and a scurrying of varmints. Poking her head out the window, she called René as he ambled past with a bucket of slop: “Help!”

  The muscular Frenchman moved every piece of furniture in the house, save for the woodstove in the northern corner, in which Guadalupe had built a fire to hurry drying last night’s freshly laundered table linen. No way could the papers be in that red-bellied stove!

  Everyone came up empty-handed. What a way to spend Christmas Day. “Braxton,” Skylla said. “He’ll know what to do.”

  Brax wasn’t particularly worried about Packard’s threat, though he did hate to see his wife derailed. Gripping Pretty Girl’s reins here at Safe Haven, she stood shaking. His new stallion sized up the mare; Brax hobbled Diablo, then tried to comfort his own pretty girl. “Titus didn’t buy the Nickel Dime. The Republic of Texas gave it to him. For fighting at the Battle of San Jacinto, in 1836.”

  “But where is the deed?”

  “Doesn’t matter. The Land Office in Austin will have a record of the land grant. The records of the decade when Texas was a nation unto itself are kept there.”

  “Yes, he was given a grant by the Republic,” she replied. “Years later, when he left Mississippi and got to it, he decided the land wasn’t for him. It was in East Texas, timber country. He wanted to ranch in wide-open spaces. He didn’t have any trouble trading for this property, since it sat in Comanche territory. The original grantee wanted to be closer to civilization.”

  Brax shook his head. “That isn’t what he told me.”

  “It’s what he said in Biloxi, on his way to Virginia.”

  “How’d you find out about his will?”

  “He left it with my father. Papa didn’t mention it, not until the War Department notified him of Uncle’s death.”

  “He didn’t leave any other papers, did he?”

  “None.” Skylla leaned back against Pretty Girl. “Search your brain, honey. What exactly did he tell you?”

  Brax stared at the longhorns grazing on buffalo grass. A hawk flew through the December sky, dipping a wing. The rush of Safe Haven’s spring echoed in Brax’s ears. It had been here at the canyon that Titus told a circle of cowboys gathered around a dying branding fire how he’d gotten the ranch. “He said the Republic gave him land, for the reason we both know. He said the Nickel Dime didn’t sit in desirable country, but he wanted it anyway Like you said, for wide-open spaces.”

  “Is that it?”

  “I’m trying to think.”

  Brax ambled over to the fire built to heat branding irons. A quartet of the new cowhands were lassoing heifers, then bulldogging them to the ground for the ropers to hog-tie. Luckless and Snuffy, the branders, took over from there. The sizzle of smoking hide clogged the air. This
wasn’t much different from the day Titus had related his tale, except on that long-ago day it had been twilight, and colder.

  What more had been said? Nothing came to mind. Brax returned to his wife. “Could be I drew my own conclusion.”

  Skylla twined her fingers into Pretty Girl’s dark-gray mane. “Would the Land Office have a record of property transfers?”

  “I doubt it. That’s county business.”

  “What should we do?”

  “Go to Austin. If we can’t find Titus’s papers. But they’ve got to be here. He wasn’t the sort not to put important items away for safekeeping.”

  Skylla’s pugnacious little nose lifted. “I told you. We’ve searched the house from stem to stern. Maybe he left the deed with his banker in Galveston.”

  “He didn’t leave his fortune there, why would he leave the deed to his ranch? We’ll search again. The boys can scour the outbuildings.” He set the men on the mission.

  Skylla climbed into the saddle. Brax did likewise. And husband and wife rode hard for the house. At the same time they tied their mounts to the hitching post, the dinner bell rang. And rang. Brax wasn’t hungry, nor did Skylla want to take time out for a meal. She hurried into the house, taking the steps at an amazing clip, considering her leg.

  Right behind her, Brax ground to a halt, seeing the mess in their home. “Y’all did tear stuff up.”

  Kathy Ann, followed by Stalking Wolf and their hazel-eyed girls, quit straightening the parlor. “How can we help?” she asked.

  Brax took a moment to contemplate the incongruous sight of a Comanche chief doing housework, and to admire the likable young woman emerged from the hellion.

  “You take the downstairs this time,” Skylla said to her sister. “Braxton and I will search upstairs.”

  René Boulogne burst through the door leading to the dining room from outdoors. Everyone stood still as the apron-wearing Frenchman bellowed. His face red with pique, he charged, “You ignore the dinner bell. I am very upsetting.”