It could take months, maybe even years, to track her down, and he was no Indian scout. It would mean quitting his job and cutting Jere loose to fend for himself... Ah, hell, he was only using his brother as an excuse. Jere had his Lily now.
It was a big place out there, out beyond the RainDance Valley. A lot of empty country where a man had no choice but to come face to face with himself and find out just what sort of man he was and wasn't. He would have to face the cowardly Drew who was afraid of the dark. And the Drew who had turned himself into a bootlicker for the Four Jacks while lying to himself that he was still his own man. And at the end of the trail he just might find a woman who really hadn't wanted him after all.
Drew pushed himself to his feet, resettling his hat on his head. It was still raining. All of a sudden he couldn't remember the last time it hadn't been raining.
"Thanks, Shiloh," he said. His throat felt thick. It was a good thing he was a high-and-mighty marshal with a gun strapped around his waist and a tin badge on his chest. Otherwise he just might be crying 'long about now.
He started down the steps, then turned back. "Did she give you this house?"
The gin-slinger grinned. "Yes, sir. She said a long time ago that if she ever left, be it feet first or head first, this place'd be mine."
Drew nodded. "She's a damn fine woman."
"Yes, sir. She's the best."
Drew stood there a moment longer, looking up at the house, at the window of the bedroom where they'd shared so many nights, and then he stepped out into the rain.
Before him the road rolled long and empty out into the prairie grass. And beyond the grass, the mountains shot up into a sky that was bigger and emptier still. But none of it was so big and empty anymore that a woman with a woodsmoke voice and a head of wine-colored hair could disappear for good and all.
Especially if she wanted to be found.
Clementine looked at the rock that lay in the scarred palm of her hand. "Explain it to me again."
Pogey gave his partner a great tharrumping whump in the ribs with his elbow. "Lemme do it this time, you blathering slack-jawed jackass. You done got her head filled up now with so many buzzing syllabic words it ain't no wonder she can't hear herself think." He turned to Clementine. "I'll give it to you straight and in two pithy words, ma'am: it's the apex law."
"Them's four words," Nash said. "Five, if'n you count the apostrophe."
"Shuddup!" Pogey bellowed, thumping him again.
While the two old prospectors stood there looking pleased with themselves and dripping rainwater on her kitchen floor, Clementine rubbed her thumb over the rough-textured rock. A rock that an assayer over in Helena had just certified as being almost pure copper ore.
She'd heard of the apex law and she had a general notion of what it was. The ownership of a vein of ore was determined by the ownership of the land on which the vein surfaced, or apexed, no matter how deep or far it spread underground. Sometimes, as in the case of the Four Jacks Copper Mine, the spot where the vein apexed was never discovered. And sometimes it was discovered on land not owned by those doing the mining, and when that happened...
"You say you found this near the madwoman's soddy?"
"We didn't find it—ugh!"
"Shut your leaky mouth, Nash. Why is it every jackass thinks he's got horse sense?... Yup, Mrs. McQueen, that there chunk of rock you're lookin' at is a piece of the Four Jacks Copper Mine that's come bustin' up out of the ground on that timber-land of yourn. Which explains why One-Eyed Jack's been camped out there, making like he's logging trees when what he's really been doin' is ensuring nobody else stumbles across that apex."
And why the Four Jacks had been pushing at her so hard to sell that land, even going so far as to shoot at her children to frighten her off. Because if the copper lode was apexing on her land, then she had a legal claim to it.
"Someone else has stumbled across it," she said. "Who was it that gave this to you and told you to get it assayed?"
A sly grin deepened the leathery wrinkles on Pogey's face. He tugged at his ear and studied the big round toe of his boot. Outside, the wind gusted and the rain splashed against the windowpanes. "That would be confidential, ma'am. Privileged information, so to speak."
"It doesn't matter anyway." Clementine whirled and headed for the door, grabbing her slicker and hat off the wall hook on the way. "What I need to do is have a look at it for myself."
"Now hold on there," Pogey cried. "Don't go off all haywire."
"Snooping around the Four Jacks' hired guns can get you leaded," Nash added. But they were talking to an empty room.
Zach Rafferty sat in his saddle in an uncomfortable state of sogginess. His yellow slicker was so old it had developed cracks that let in water worse than an old sod roof. And the wind set the brim of his hat to flapping, sluicing cold water down the back of his neck.
He looked through the dripping, scraggly pines to the wide gray sky and the line of broken, rain-black bluffs. He shook himself hard and got rid of some of the water. But he couldn't shake off his thoughts.
He rode to the top of the highest bluff. From here he could see the madwoman's soddy and all of Clementine's timberland, mostly bald now, thanks to the strip logging. He'd ridden over every inch of that timberland this morning and all he'd discovered was a bunch of slash piles and stumps. No logging was being done here now, and hadn't been since before the heap pit altercation. Still, the Four Jacks always seemed to have at least one man around, watching over the place. Sure enough the revver had to be pulling some sort of bunco out here, Rafferty thought. But whatever it was, he was damned if he could see it.
He pushed his legs out straight in the stirrups and drew in a breath big enough to stretch his chest. The RainDance country had changed a lot since he'd first laid eyes on it. It had been grazed and mined and logged, its lonely emptiness filled up with towns and people. He supposed some would say it had been tamed.
But the jagged snow-dusted peaks still threatened to poke holes in the sky, and there were places in those mountains he knew of where the trees still grew thick enough to block the sun. And come summer, he knew, the buffalo grass would still grow as high as a man's waist, and the chokecherries would still hang fat and black on the trees down by the river.
This country... God, he loved it. Though it sure could make a man ache inside, make him feel good and sad, and a little wild sometimes. Country like this could make a man believe that anything was possible. And it could make him hurt deep inside to know how he was wasting all his possibilities.
He could feel his love for her swelling inside him, like there was another being in there trying to burst through the bone and muscle and skin, trying to get out and be the man she needed, the man she deserved.
He had just started to pull his horse's head around when he heard the gunshot.
The water roared as it rushed through the coulee. It was swollen now, as deep as a man on horseback, and it cut through the steep-sided ravine, carrying along with it rocks, chunks of earth, the slash piles, and even good-sized pine and cottonwood saplings. The rain continued to pour down in wind-tossed sheets that flattened the grass and bowed what was left of the trees.
Nash had said the ore sample was found on the hillside about fifty yards downstream from the madwoman's soddy. Clementine tied up her horse and made the climb on foot. She carried her Winchester with a round in the chamber, even though it was dangerous, what with the going so rough, the rocks greasy with rain, the mud slick and crumbling. She wasn't sure what she would do once she found the apex. Just look at it, she supposed, and savor, for Gus's sake, the sweet irony that they had been the true owners of the Four Jacks Copper Mine all along.
She had scrambled maybe halfway up the slope when the two men rose up out of the black rocks like specters out of a grave—Percivale Kyle and One-Eyed Jack McQueen. She saw the pearl-handled revolver in Kyle's hand, saw him raise and point it at her.
And she shot him.
The smack of th
e rifle explosion echoed up and down the coulee. Kyle spun around on his toes like an opera dancer, flinging his arms wide as he fell down into the ravine, taking mud and rocks and branches with him.
Clementine looked wide-eyed at the man lying sprawled on his back over the rocks, his long yellow hair trailing in the rushing muddy water. Then she turned her gaze, and the Winchester, onto her father-in-law. Between them the rain slashed down like a silver beaded curtain.
Jack McQueen clicked his tongue against his teeth, shaking his head. He hadn't even bothered to glance at Kyle. "Damn me, woman, but if you aren't turning out to be a revelation. "'I have appeared unto thee for this purpose, to make thee a minister and a witness.' Yes, indeedy. Smart as the crack of a whip, you are, and with the guts to go with it. A pure revelation." His lips pulled back from his teeth in a cagey smile. "Why, I'd almost consider taking you on as a partner... if I thought I could trust you."
His one eye watched her with the intensity of two. He took a step.
Clementine tightened her grip on the Winchester. Her stomach clenched and spasmed, and her legs kept wanting to shake. And she was cold, so cold. She kept thinking of that yellow hair floating in the stream, and she felt a terrible need to look at him again, to see if he was really dead. Yet she didn't dare to, couldn't bear to.
Jack McQueen took another careful step. "You've discovered the existence of the apex, haven't you, my dear daughter-in-law. I was afraid you might."
The rifle trembled in Clementine's hands, then stilled. "Don't," she said.
"So now what are we going to do about it?" he said. He took another step.
The crack was so loud Clementine thought it had come from a cannon rather than a gun, and she hadn't even pulled the trigger. The ground gave out beneath her feet, and there was a great thundering rumble as if the earth were splitting in two.
The hillside came sliding down on top of them.
CHAPTER 34
The wet red Montana mud smothered her, burying her alive, even as it carried her down the ravine like so much debris.
She felt as if she were tumbling end over and end inside a great churn that was thick with mud. She was trapped in a suffocating blackness, the weight of the gumbo pressing on her chest, pressing, pressing, pressing her ribs into her lungs, crushing her like a pile of stones.
She clawed at the mud, thrusting, digging, pushing through it, and at last, at last, her head popped free. Still, the mud clogged her mouth and nose and eyes, blinding her, choking her. She pulled one arm loose of its sucking hold and rubbed at her face, trying to clear a way to breathe.
She drew in great drafts of rain and air. And still she was being carried along by the heaving, churning mud. She could hear the wild rushing of the water through the coulee below her and knew that if she hit that rock-filled chasm she would die. A pine tree, too small to be of interest to the Four Jacks loggers, whipped at her face, and she grabbed for it. Needles and branches scraped through her hands as the sliding mud tugged her along with it, but somehow the tree held.
Wasn't holding... for she could feel its roots begin to give way. She stretched out a desperate hand, trying to grasp another, bigger tree that remained just out of reach. And then she saw it, coming out of the rain-drenched sky—a rawhide rope looped into a lasso. She lunged, just as the tree gave way, trusting to the rope and the cowboy who wielded it.
And the lasso swung true, settling over her head and shoulders. She gave a little cry as it jerked hard, tightening and cutting into her flesh, and she was pulled out of the sucking, clinging mud.
She crawled onto blessedly firm ground. A strong arm supported her as she struggled to push herself half upright, bracing her weight on her straight, outstretched arms. She retched and spat the mud out her mouth as her heaving lungs fought for air.
"Lord God, Boston, what the hell were you doing?" He hauled her up against his chest and held her so tight she couldn't breathe again.
Her fists gripped the wet leather of his jacket and she burrowed into him, rubbing her face against his chest. "You left me again," she said. "You left me."
"I thought I'd lost you. Dammit, Jesus Christ, and God almighty, I thought I'd lost you..."
She pushed him away from her, so hard he rocked back on his heels. "You left me without even a 'So long, darlin'.'"
The rain poured over them, mixing with the red mud. He'd lost his hat somewhere, and his hair clung sleekly wet to his head, dripping water. The whole front of his chest and face looked like a mud pie.
"Well, shit," he said, "I didn't get far."
She spat the grit out of her mouth, "What if I don't want you back?"
"You want me." She lifted her hand to push the mud-logged hair out of her face, but he did it for her and his touch was so tender, so gentle. "Quit it. Jesus, we've got to quit this. It's like tempting God or something."
Suddenly she was shaking so hard she had to hug herself. She looked around her. The slope of the ravine where she'd been standing only moments before was now a scooped-out cavity in the earth, and the ravine was now in the bottom of the coulee, damming up the mountain runoff and creating a lake that was drowning the logged-off stumps and slash piles, the logging camp and the madwoman's soddy, and the apex of the Four Jacks Copper Mine.
There was no sign of One-Eyed Jack McQueen.
"Rafferty... your father was standing right in front of me when that hillside went."
He was trying to wipe the mud and water off her face with his bandanna. "I know. I saw him... I only had the one rope."
She touched one corner of his hard mouth with her fingers. He rarely showed what he was feeling; a man like him never did. But she'd lived out here long enough to understand the code he lived by. His father had been killed by the land that he had so callously raped and plundered. A man, if he was man enough, didn't kick about it when it came time to pay the price for what he had done.
He dropped the bandanna and wrapped his fingers around her wrist. He held her hand in place so that he could turn his head and brush his lips across her knuckles.
"I'm scared," she said, and her voice broke with the force of what she was feeling. "You scare me, Rafferty. I love you too much, and you're hurting me."
He smiled, and it was a smile that wasn't like him at all. It was sweet and wistful. "I ain't gonna tell you not to be scared, or that I'll never hurt you again." His hand still held hers, and he was rubbing her palm with his thumb in slow, gentle circles. "Hell, I don't know why I rode out on you this morning, except that maybe I had to try to leave, just so I could understand why I had to stay."
Tears welled in her eyes, blurring his image until he seemed less real than a dream. You love him, she thought, and then you lose him to the wildness in his soul. Her throat was so tight it hurt to talk. "It shouldn't be so hard—"
He let go of her hand and pressed his fingers against her lips, stopping her words. "It's hard, Clementine. Hard for a man to look into a woman's eyes and see love lookin' back at him. And to know that when she's lookin' at him, she's seeing not what he is, but what he ought to be."
"You are the world to me."
He laughed raggedly. "And you say you're scared." He gripped the sides of her head and stared at her a long, still moment. "I ain't like my brother. I ain't responsible like he was, or godly, or any of those other things that makes a woman a good husband. But I got to hope there's a man like that buried somewhere inside of me if I have the guts to go lookin' for him. I want to become that man, Clementine, if only for myself."
He was looking at her with his heart and his pride naked in his eyes, and she thought of how she had searched so long for those missing places in her own heart, and of how she had found them. "I am the bear," she said.
His thumbs were stroking the sensitive skin behind her ears. His eyes had turned hot and intense in the way they did just before he kissed her. "You're the what?" he said, his voice husky with desire.
She shook her head within the embrace of his hands, smiling thr
ough her tears and happiness and hope. "Nothing... I love you."
He lowered his mouth over hers in a kiss that was rough and hungry and desperate. He kissed her forever, and she wrapped her arms around his waist and held on.
His hands fell to her shoulders and he set her back, and she thought it was so that she could see his face and know the truth of his words. "I love you, darlin'," he said. "So much, so much..."
By the time the first shot was fired over the stage driver's head, Hannah Yorke would have committed highway robbery herself if it would have gotten her out of the belly of the lurching, swaying coach.
She'd been sick all the day before on the train and sick all day today on the stagecoach. An hour ago the rain had finally stopped and the sun had come out hot and started baking the damp, mildewy horsehair seats and leather curtains. And Hannah Yorke had bent over and spewed up the oily coffee she'd drunk at the last swing station into the zinc bucket between her legs.
She was still bent over the bucket when the shooting started. "Heaven preserve us, we'll all be killed!" the woman sitting next to her screamed, and Hannah fervently wished this would be so. The woman smelled of old talcum powder and canned sardines.
Although there was a man riding shotgun up on the box next to the driver, the stagecoach slogged to a stop after that first spurt of gunfire. Through a haze of fresh nausea, Hannah heard men's voices raised in consternation and then gruff acknowledgment. The coach dipped as the driver descended, and a moment later the door jerked open.
Hannah pushed the widow's veil out of her sweating face and raised her head and looked with blurry eyes at a whisker-grizzled face. "There's a marshal out here from Rainbow Springs, ma'am," the driver said, giving her a look full of sly curiosity. "Says he's got a warrant fer yer arrest."
"I knew she was no better than she ought to be," the woman huffed to her husband, who was slat-rail thin and smelled of pickled beets. "The hussy!"
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