Ralph Compton Texas Hills

by Ralph Compton

  Harland and Thaxter both turned, Thaxter with his hand near his Colt.

  “Well, look who it is,” the latter said, and glanced at Luke’s Remington. “The gunhand.”

  “Be nice,” Harland said. “You remember what Pa told us.”

  Amanda and Estelle stood side by side, their backs to the pump, a bucket at their feet. Their dresses were plain, their shoes the kind a fancy city girl would scoff at. Amanda, or “Mandy” as they called her, was taller, almost as tall as Luke, with the bluest eyes in the family. Folks were always saying how pretty she was. Estelle had their ma’s broad shoulders, and a nose much too long and wide for her face. She hated it.

  “They behaving themselves, sis?” Luke asked.

  Her cheeks still pink, Mandy nonetheless nodded. “Harland, here, was saying how he’d like to come courting sometime.”

  “What?”

  “I said it polite,” Harland said. “No disrespect intended.”

  Luke stepped up to him so they were practically nose to nose. “You better treat her with respect.”

  “Don’t threaten me.”

  “Be nice, brother,” Thaxter said, mimicking Harland, and laughed. “You remember what Pa told us.”

  For a moment Luke thought Harland would take a swing at him. Instead, Harland’s mouth curled in an odd sort of smile.

  “That’s right. We need you Burnetts, if it’s to work out.”

  “If what is?” Mandy asked. She was staring at Luke, and gave a slight motion of her head. Reluctantly, Luke took a step back.

  “We’re going into the cattle business together, girl,” Harland said. “Your family and mine.”

  “We’re farmers, not ranchers,” Luke said.

  “You thought you were,” Thaxter said.

  “Everyone knows we farm,” Luke said, and couldn’t resist adding, “It’s more than you do for a living.”

  Thaxter glowered and went to take a step, but Harland held out a hand, stopping him. “Those longhorns won’t herd themselves.”

  “Longhorns?” Mandy said.

  “Money on the hoof, little lady,” Harland said. “Even as we speak, our pa and your pa are striking a deal to make all of us rich.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Mandy said.

  “Is it?” Harland pointed at the house.

  Their fathers had just come outside and were shaking hands.

  “Yes, sir,” Harland declared. “We’re going to be right close from here on out.” He chuckled and winked at Mandy.

  Chapter 6

  Jasper Weaver was getting drunk. Again. Jasper liked to get drunk. He liked the euphoric feeling that came over him, liked the fact that all his cares melted away and he could drift along, as it were, on inner tides of peace and happiness.

  Lord knew, his life was anything but peaceful. For starters, there was Wilda. Or, as Jasper liked to think of her, “the Shrew,” with a capital S. Wilda never stopped carping, never ceased criticizing. She’d complain and she’d complain, and then she’d complain some more. To hear her tell it, he’d never done a thing right in his entire life.

  The funny thing was—if by “funny” you meant “sad”—she hadn’t been such a shrew before they got hitched. No, Jasper distinctly recollected that she’d been as quiet as the proverbial mouse, hardly ever saying a word unless he asked for her opinion, and even then, her replies never once gave a hint of her true nature. No, that came later.

  Jasper got his first whiff of the foul odor his marriage would become on their wedding night. He’d looked forward to finally being able to do what he’d hankered after ever since their first kiss. Not that the kiss had been all that memorable. It was more of a peck. But it was his first time kissing a girl, and amazingly, she hadn’t slapped him and hit him with a rock.

  Jasper knew he wasn’t much of a prize. Not when it came to his looks. His own ma used to call his face ratty, and his neck was long enough for two men. Add that to his hook nose and buckteeth, and he was about the least handsome man alive.

  Girls had taken to him about the same as they would to smallpox. When he was little, they were always poking fun. One even went so far as to say he should put a burlap sack over his head to spare them misery.

  No, when it came to females, Jasper had about resigned himself to living his life alone. Then along came Wilda. They had a lot in common. She was an only child, like him. She was shy, like him. Awkward, like him. And, the truth be known, about as attractive as a bedbug. She was all bone, with a face as ratlike as his own. When he first saw her, he had the impression he was looking into a strange sort of mirror. She was a female version of him. So, naturally, they were drawn to each other.

  Jasper courted Wilda for a year before she agreed to say “I do.” With her mother as chaperone, he’d sit in their parlor and make small talk the best he knew how. Now and then they’d go for a stroll, and after eight months or so, she let him hold her hand.

  Jasper remembered that day fondly. It had been in the fall. The leaves were rustling. It was a windy day with a chill in the air. They’d bundled up and gone for a stroll to a pond near her house, and halfway around, without really thinking about it, he’d covered her hand with his. He did it because his fingers were cold and he thought hers would warm him. But her fingers were ice. She didn’t pull away, though, which encouraged him to squeeze her hand. When she squeezed back, he thought he’d died and gone to heaven.

  The day of their wedding, Jasper was so nervous he could hardly get his brain to work. It was a small ceremony: her folks and his, and a few kin and friends.

  The pastor was old Reverend Willis, whose perpetually red nose was a testament to his fondness for whiskey. When Reverend Willis said that Jasper could kiss the bride, Jasper had eagerly pressed his mouth to hers. All Wilda did was stand there as stiff as a board. She didn’t kiss back. That should have told him something right there.

  That night, the true Wilda, as Jasper liked to think of her, showed her real self for the first time.

  They had prepared for bed. Jasper put on a nightshirt and couldn’t wait to strip it off again. He’d entertained naughty notions about Wilda for so long, he was anxious to consummate their marriage, as folks put it. Unknown to him, his idea of consummation and hers were two different things.

  “Now before you start in,” Wilda had said, sitting with her back to the headboard and pressing her hand to his chest to stop him from reaching for her, “we have to set the rules.”

  “The what?”

  “The rules. Like my ma taught me. She says that without rules, all sorts of unpleasant things can happen.”

  His body so hot he felt like he was on fire, Jasper had said in confusion, “All I want to do is to make love to you.”

  “And that’s your right as my husband,” Wilda said. “So long as you do it proper.”

  Jasper had wondered if maybe his pa had neglected to pass on an important fact of life with regards to matrimony. “We can’t just do it?”

  “I should say not. The proprieties must be observed.”

  “I didn’t know there were any.”

  “Exactly my point. So here’s how it will be.” Wilda had paused. “We do it clothed—”

  “What?”

  “Don’t interrupt. We do it with our clothes on. Or our nightshirts, rather, since we’re only to do it at night, after we retire, and then only on nights when I feel up to it and don’t have a headache or a womanly complaint. I’ll allow kissing but only with your mouth shut. None of that tongue stuff. Tongues are too wet for my taste. And don’t touch me more than you absolutely have to. I don’t like being touched. Now, I don’t know how many times a month you expect me to give in to your needs but my ma says once a month was good enough for my pa and it should be good enough for you.”

  Jasper had been so stunned, he hadn’t known what to say. So he’d blurted the fir
st thing that popped into his head. “What the hell?”

  “None of that,” Wilda had said sternly. “My ma didn’t put up with any of that kind of language from my pa, and I won’t abide it, neither. There’s not to be any swearing around me.”

  Jasper had sat back in bewilderment. No cussing, and hardly any lovemaking? What had he gotten himself into? “Is there anything else?” he’d asked, half in jest.

  “There are lots of things that will help us get along better,” Wilda said. “You’re not to track dirt in. You’re not to use the chamber pot when I’m in the room. You’re not to try and boss me around like some men do because I simply won’t stand for it. You’re to always open doors for me and treat me like a perfect lady. And once we have a child, we’ll sit down and have another of these talks since I’m not sure I want more than one and it seems pointless to keep on doing, well, you know, if nothing is ever going to come of it.”

  Jasper had actually pinched himself, pinched his own leg, half-thinking he was imagining this, but no, there she sat, as rigid as at the altar and as cold as winter snow, smiling happily now that she had laid down the matrimonial law.

  That was the start. The next morning, at breakfast, she’d mentioned how she didn’t like that he chewed with his mouth open, and did he have to slurp his milk instead of swallow it, and he should do something about his cowlick.

  Now, alone in their kitchen, Jasper glumly raised the whiskey bottle to his mouth and took a long swallow. The sound of footsteps on the stairs galvanized him into quickly rising and shoving the bottle into the cupboard and sitting back down again, his hands folded in front of him, before she came down the hall.

  “What are you doing?” Wilda asked suspiciously.

  Jasper shrugged. “Thinking about things.”

  “Don’t think too much. It’s not good for you.” Wilda went to the counter and filled a glass with water from the pitcher. “I’d like a few more words with you about this longhorn business.”

  “You already made it clear you want me to do it,” Jasper said.

  “Why wouldn’t I? You expect me to live like this forever?”

  “You knew I was a farmer when you married me. And living out in these hills was your idea, not mine.”

  “Don’t nitpick,” Wilda said. “As for the longhorns, Gareth Kurst is right. This is a once-in-a-lifetime proposition. Think of what we could do with ten or twenty or thirty thousand dollars.”

  “I never gave much thought to being rich.”

  “Another of your faults. But that’s all right. I’ve been doing the thinking for both of us for a long time. You’re to help the Kursts and the Burnetts, and when you get our share of the money, you’re to come right back here and give it to me.” As an afterthought, Wilda added, “And don’t forget to take Reuben. It will do him a world of good.”

  “I never knew making money mattered that much to you,” Jasper said, not without a touch of bitterness.

  “Why wouldn’t it? I’m normal, like everybody else. We can start a whole new life. Be happy, for once.”

  “I wouldn’t mind more happiness in my life,” Jasper bleakly conceded.

  “Just so you don’t get carried away with it,” Wilda said.

  Chapter 7

  Gareth Kurst heard himself whistling and stopped. He hardly ever whistled—or hummed, for that matter. People who did were usually in a good mood. He was hardly ever in a good mood. But at the moment Gareth was as pleased as he’d ever been about anything. The prospect of being rich did that to a man.

  His two oldest were riding single file behind him, on their way home after their visit to the Burnetts. They came to where the trail widened, and his sons gigged their mounts up on either side of his.

  “That was slick, Pa,” Harland said, “you talking them into it.”

  “Burnett did most of it,” Gareth said. “He was the one who convinced his missus. That contrary female had her nerve. Why he lets her get away with it, I’ll never know. But then, a lot of men do. They go around with whip marks on their backs.”

  Harland laughed. “At least she agreed we can try the roundup for a week or so, and see how things go. If they go well, we can keep on until we have our herd, and off to Abilene we go.”

  “I can’t believe how he lets his woman butt in like she does,” Thaxter said. “None of his women know their place.”

  “It’s not like the old days, boys,” Gareth said. “A lot of women think they should have the same say as men.” He remembered something he’d heard a while back. “There’s even talk of giving them the vote.”

  “The hell you say, Pa,” Harland said. “Female brains don’t work like ours. They can’t savvy stuff like that. Giving women the vote will send this country straight to the dogs.”

  Thaxter grinned. “That Burnett gal must have a good brain, seeing as how you’re so sweet on her.”

  “Just because I might court her doesn’ t mean I think she’s smart,” Harland said.

  Gareth’s interest perked. “What’s this about courting?”

  “Harland is smitten by that Mandy,” Thaxter said. “He probably dreams about her at night.”

  “Keep it up,” Harland said.

  “Is this true?” Gareth asked, and could tell by his oldest’s expression that it was.

  “She’s the prettiest gal in these parts, Pa,” Harland said. “Who wouldn’t want to court her? I let her know I’m of a mind to, is all.”

  “No and no,” Gareth said.

  “Now hold on, Pa,” Harland began.

  “No. You listen, and listen good,” Gareth said. “I won’t have anything spoil this longhorn business. We need the Burnetts and we need the Weavers. Doing it all ourselves would take forever. You picked a bad time to be randy. Save your courting for after we’ve sold the herd and have our money.”

  “Damn,” Harland said.

  “Think about it, boy,” Gareth said. “Think of the courting you could do with a thousand dollars in your poke. That’s how much I aim to give each of you if this comes to pass.”

  “A thousand dollars?” Thaxter said, and did some whistling of his own. “Why, I could get a new Colt, one with ivory handles.”

  “You can get anything your heart desires,” Gareth said, and turned back to Harland. “So long as you keep your pecker in your pants.”

  “She’s not like that, Pa,” Harland said sulkily. “She doesn’t work at a saloon. I’d have to court her proper.”

  “No courting, and that’s final.” To soften the sting, Gareth said, “I’d take it as a personal favor, son. I don’t often ask much. But this here is one of those golden opportunities folks talk about. We can have more money than we’ll know what to do with if we play our cards right.”

  “I suppose,” Harland said.

  “How hard do you reckon it will be?” Thaxter asked. “Corralling all those critters?”

  As fate would have it, just then there was a loud snort from up ahead, and a longhorn strode out of the brush into the middle of the trail and stood staring.

  Gareth and his sons drew rein, Thaxter exclaiming, “Lordy, look at the horns on that thing.”

  A brindle bull, it packed close to a thousand pounds on its big-boned frame. The horns had to be pretty near seven feet from tip to tip.

  Gareth suddenly had an inspiration and reached for a rope. “Let’s give it a try and see how it goes.”

  “Pa?” Harland said.

  “Help me catch it.” Gareth wasn’t much of a hand at roping but he had roped cattle before and could toss a fair loop. He got ready, watching the bull. All it did was stand there and stare.

  “You ask me, I’d rather shoot it,” Thaxter said uncertainly. “It’d be safer.”

  “The meat buyers in Abilene don’t pay for dead longhorns,” Gareth said, holding the loop close to his leg. “You two set?”
/>   “If he lets us rope him, I’ll be plumb amazed,” Harland said.

  The moment Gareth started forward, the bull snorted and plunged into the brush. Gareth used his spurs. He was determined not to let this bull get away. Reining right and left, he glimpsed its hindquarters and tail.

  Thaxter let out a holler. “Keep after him, Pa!”

  It wasn’t easy. The bull picked the thickest brush to plow through, no doubt to throw them off, and some of that brush was thorny. Gareth winced as what felt like a handful of nails tore at his left leg. Jabbing his spurs harder, he sought to end the chase quickly but the bull pulled ahead, and before Gareth knew it, was out of sight and making good on its escape.

  Gareth drew rein in disgust and came to a stop.

  “Well, that didn’t go well,” Harland said.

  “I’ve torn my pant leg,” Thaxter said.

  “So did I.” Gareth looked down. He was bleeding from cuts caused by the thorns. “We’ll need chaps for each of us.”

  “You still aim to try and corral a herd?” Harland said.

  “This doesn’t prove anything,” Gareth said. “We have a chance to be rich, and I’m not letting anything or anyone stand in our way.”

  Chapter 8

  The Burnett family had just sat down to supper when there was a knock on their front door. Owen stood and said he’d see who it was.

  Philomena promptly rose, too. “I’ll go with you.”

  “There’s no need, dearest,” Owen said. “Sit there and relax.”

  “I don’t feel like relaxing.” Philomena was peeved that he’d told Gareth Kurst he’d give the longhorn business a try even though she’d made it plain she didn’t think it was a good idea.

  As they walked down the hall, Owen placed his hand on her arm. “You’re still upset, aren’t you?”

  “You ignored my wishes and forced me to give in.”

  “All I did was agree to try it for a while,” Owen said. “I haven’t committed to anything.”

  “You only think you haven’t,” Philomena said.