by Paul Bagdon
“I think I’m going to need two today, but let’s start with one.” Lee settled into one of the pair of wooden chairs at a small table and sighed deeply, grateful for the relief her feet were experiencing as she took the weight off her pinching, constricting high-button shoes. Never again, she thought. I don’t care what the occasion is. I’ll either wear my boots or go barefoot.
Bessie surveyed the other tables and then sat with Lee, placing a mug of lemonade in front of her. “Having a good time?” she asked.
After taking a long series of swallows, Lee answered, “It’s a real nice celebration, Bessie. I heard the band earlier, listened to a speech, watched the buffalo hunters shoot. And I watched a young fellow ride a stallion into the ground.”
“Men were gambling on that, you know,” Bessie said. “I wouldn’t have any part of it if I were you. Scripture warns us against gambling.”
Lee drank again. “I wasn’t gambling,” she said. “You know that. I’m in the horse business, and I was interested in the rider. Since Tomas left we don’t have a bronco man. We need one.”
As if placated, Bessie leaned forward, closer to Lee, and lowered her voice. “He was in this morning for breakfast,” she said. “He has the nicest manners a person could hope for, and the deepest blue eyes . . .”
“I’m sure he has,” Lee said, grinning. “What’s his name? Where’s he from? All I’ve heard are rumors from my ranch hands.”
“He told me his name’s Wade, but he didn’t give a last name. I was too busy to chat more than a few seconds. I heard from someone else that he worked breaking horses for the Confederacy and after the war went to some big outfit—Goodright? Good something or other, anyway.”
Lee nodded her head. “That’d be Charlie Goodnight. He has the largest herds of cattle and horses in Texas. This Wade must be awfully good. Mr. Goodnight is cautious about who he signs on.”
Bessie leaned forward again. “He isn’t much older than I am. When he smiled at me—”
The opening of the door drew the attention of both women. Carlos stood in the doorway for a moment, letting his eyes adjust to the dimness. Next to him stood the man who’d ridden the stallion.
Lee had a moment to inspect him. He was perhaps five feet, ten inches tall, and whipcord lean. He held his hat in one hand and stood calmly, comfortably, the yellow of his hair like a shock of wheat atop his darkly tanned face. A smear of dried blood clung to his cheek, but the rest of it had been scrubbed away. Lee sensed a certain ease about the man, as if he were quite sure he could handle anything or anyone who confronted him. It wasn’t arrogance, she decided, nor a practiced front he’d developed. But just what it was confused her and made her a little uneasy.
As Carlos led Wade to the table, Lee saw that Bessie’s gushing about Wade’s eyes hadn’t been exaggerated. They were a piercing and direct cobalt blue, and Lee speculated they could probably become diamond-hard at times.
“Miss Lee Morgan,” Carlos said, “meet Wade Stuart.”
Lee smiled up at Wade. “Please—pull up a chair. Let’s talk for a few moments.”
Wade grinned, revealing almost startlingly straight and white teeth, a rarity among men in Burnt Rock, and probably the whole of Texas. “Pleased to meet you, ma’am,” he said, sliding a chair over from an adjacent table.
Bessie stood, suddenly red-faced. “I’d better work to get back—get back to—” She halted and quickly added, “Good seeing you,” as she hustled off.
“Miss Bessie,” Wade said to the girl’s back. Then he sat across from Lee as Carlos pulled up another chair to the small table. The bronc man’s eyes met and locked with Lee’s for a long moment. Lee thought she saw the hardness she’d perceived earlier, but she wasn’t quite sure.
“Carlos has offered you a job with us, Mr. Stuart?” she asked.
“Yes, ma’am, he sure has. I just wanted to know a bit more about your place, what’d be expected of me, and so forth. And, to tell you the truth, I think Carlos was a bit light on the pay.”
“Let’s get back to the salary in a moment, Mr. Stuart. We’re offering you the job of top hand, and we’ll compensate you fairly.”
Wade nodded. “Yes, ma’am. But I’m a bronc man, and I don’t do anything but break and train horses. You can call me a top hand or call me a prairie dog, but either way I don’t do anything but work with horses. I don’t hang fence, I don’t paint barns, I don’t dig wells, and I don’t clean stalls.” He hesitated for a moment. “I’m not meaning to sound pushy, ma’am, but those are my terms.”
Lee met his eyes again. “Are you quite sure you’re good enough to make demands like that, Mr. Stuart?”
“Yes, ma’am. I’m sure.” He smiled, and the grin seemed to wipe ten years off his face. For a moment he looked like a grammar-school boy. But Lee knew he meant what he’d said.
“I see.” She let a minute pass. “Are you interested in working for the Busted Thumb, Mr. Stuart?”
“I’d give it a try, Miss Morgan,” he said carefully. “As long as we understand each other and the money is decent. Thing is, I’m not sure what your operation is all about.”
“I can fill you in on that,” Lee said. “What I’m attempting to do is create a new strain of western horses bred exclusively for ranch work. They need to be fast, intelligent, and very quick on their feet. They need cow sense. And they need endurance, Mr. Stuart. My horses must work hard for long periods of time under the worst conditions the West can offer them. Most of all, my horses need heart.”
Wade looked uneasy. “No offense, Miss Morgan,” he said, “but do you ... well ... know what you’re doing? Crossing blood in horses has caused more harm than good for lots of—”
“I’m sure you’ve heard of Morgan horses, Mr. Stuart.”
“Sure ... but what ... ?”
“My uncle—the man who raised me—is Noah Morgan. He’s a great-great grandson of Justin Morgan, who brought the Morgan horse breed into being. Noah was the finest horseman I’ve ever met, and I lived with him and his family since I was six years old. And I worked by his side at his horse operation for many years, until I went off on my own—with his blessing. I know horses, Mr. Stuart—perhaps even better than you do.”
Again, the disarming grin spread across Wade’s face. “Can’t ride them like I can, though,” he said. He let that comment settle for a moment and then asked, “How much and what kind of stock do you have now? Where are you in finding the cross you’re after?”
Lee glanced at Carlos and nodded. “Why don’t you answer Mr. Stuart?” she said.
Carlos cleared his throat noisily before speaking. “We ’ave almost two hundred horses now, mostly mares an’ geldings, an’ maybe sixty colts an’ fillies still at their mama’s side. We ’ave thirteen stallion. We thin’ we ’ave what we want. We very close to breeding the best ranch horses in Texas.”
“What pays the bills while all this breeding is going on?” Wade asked.
“We sell the mares and stallions that don’ work out, and sell trained geldings for ranch work. Ees a good business—a strong business.”
Just then, Lee caught Bessie’s attention and motioned her over to the table. “Coffee, gentlemen? Lemonade?” she asked. Carlos asked for coffee; Lee and Wade requested lemonade.
The silence at the table was a comfortable, contemplative one while they waited for the beverages. When Bessie, her face once again a bright red, had brought the drinks, Lee took a long sip. Then, abruptly, she asked, “Are you interested in the job, Mr. Stuart?”
“I am, ma’am. I surely am. Thing is, Carlos offered me only forty-five dollars a month.”
“What do you think your services are worth?”
Wade drank the lemonade, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and smiled. “More’n you or anybody else can pay me, Miss Morgan. But I’ll sign on with the Busted Thumb for fifty-five dollars a month, assuming the grub’s decent and the housing comfortable.”
“Done, then,” Lee said. “Fifty-five dollars a
month. Carlos’s wife, Maria, is our cook. You won’t find better food anywhere. You’ll find the tenant house quite acceptable too.”
“That’s just fine, ma’am,” Wade said, rising from his chair. “It’s a deal, then.”
“One more thing, Mr. Stuart.”
“Ma’am?”
“The Busted Thumb is a decent and proper ranch. I’ve given my life to the Lord, and so have Carlos and Maria. We pray together most evenings, right after dinner. You’re welcome to join us. Some of the hands do, and some don’t.”
For the first time, the young man appeared flustered. “I thank you, ma’am. But I don’t think I will. No disrespect intended.”
“That’s completely up to you,” Lee said, smiling to soften her words. “There are a few rules, though. I don’t allow whiskey or beer on my land, and I don’t allow men to have lady visitors. There’s no gambling and there’s no cussing or taking the Lord’s name in vain. We’re honest in all our dealings with each other and with customers.”
“That’s all fine with me, Miss Morgan. I’ll collect my things from the hotel, then,” Wade said, turning away.
Lee held out her hand. “One more thing, Mr. Stuart. You’re wearing a gun belt and you have a knife tucked into your left boot. I saw the handle when you were riding. No weapons are carried on my land by those who work for me, except when it’s absolutely necessary.”
For a moment, Lee again thought she saw a cold, flinty spark in Wade Stuart’s eyes, but if she had, it was gone as quickly as it had come.
“You’re the boss,” he said. “My Colt’s only for rattlesnakes and coyotes, anyway.” He smiled at Lee and Carlos. “I’ll be back here in ten minutes or so.”
As Wade walked to the door, Carlos spoke quietly to Lee. “Don’ need no fancy bone grips on a peestol to shoot rattlers with,” he said.
“And no knife in a boot either,” Lee added.
* * *
2
* * *
Marshall Ben Flood closed his Bible, leaned back, and sipped at the mug of tea Lee had prepared at the beginning of the evening. The mid-August heat was oppressive, and the air in Lee’s parlor, usually stirred at least slightly by a night breeze, was heavy and listless.
“There’s more in Leviticus than I ever realized,” Ben said. “Reminds me of how little I really know about Scripture.”
Lee smiled. “It’s not like a mathematics book, Ben,” she said. “The Bible is alive—just as all the words of Jesus Christ are alive. Scripture’s a big part of any Christian’s life.”
“Or should be, anyway,” Ben answered ruefully.
Lee smiled again, thinking of how she had been more than a little surprised to discover over a year ago that Ben was a practicing Christian. His acceptance of Jesus Christ seemed incongruous to Lee. After all, he was a lawman who’d killed in the line of duty, who ran a tight town, who wore a Colt .45 in a holster that rested low on his right leg, tied down gunfighter-style with a piece of latigo. And he looked like a hard man: tall, lean, and muscled, with shoulder-length dark but graying hair and obsidian eyes that looked as if they’d observed far too much violence and pain for any one lifetime. But Lee had also seen Ben’s eyes soften and glint with quick laughter.
Lee took comfort in the fact that she wasn’t the only one to have faulty first impressions. Ben had once admitted to her that he hadn’t known what to expect when he’d first heard of her operation coming to Burnt Rock. He’d never met a woman who owned and ran a horse farm. Would she be the wife of a rich man, playing with horses a few hours a week between cotillions and dinner parties? Or a rough, crude, and flinty woman who had to prove to herself and to everyone else that she was better than any man? But when he’d introduced himself to Lee in the café, he’d known within a half minute that his preconceptions were terribly wrong.
“How’s your bronc man workin’ out?” he asked as Lee began clearing the cups and teapot from the table.
“His work is excellent, Ben. He’s out there before the sun each morning, checking the stock he’s working with, doctoring them like they were little children, handling them, talking to them. I’ve never seen a better trainer, and I’ve seen more than a few of them. He ... well ...”
“He what, Lee?”
She hesitated for a moment before speaking. “It’s just that I don’t know a thing more about him today than when I hired him over a month ago. He doesn’t visit with the other men at all. I’ve invited him here for dinner a couple of times, just as I do with all my new hands, but he turned me down—politely—both times.”
“Could be he’s just a loner. Carlos said he was in the war. Lots of those fellas came home changed—and haunted. The Rebs had boys of fourteen and even younger fightin’ toward the end.” He shook his head sadly. “I just can’t imagine what seein’ an’ bein’ in the midst of those battles would do to a boy’s mind.”
“I suppose. But still—there’s something, well, dark about him. I’m nervous having him around, to tell you the truth. But his work is so good, and it’s not as if he’s done or said anything wrong.”
Ben stood and moved his shoulders, as if to ease some stiffness. He met Lee’s eyes. “What is it? You’re not one to spook like this.”
Lee shook her head. “I just don’t know ... except that there’s something about Wade Stuart that makes me feel ... vulnerable, maybe.”
“You’re a little afraid of him,” Ben observed quietly.
Lee stiffened, and the mugs and teapot in her hands clinked together as she did so. “I’m not—” she began heatedly and then stopped abruptly. “Maybe. I don’t really know.”
“I’ll talk to him.”
“No, Ben! Please. Leave him be. If there’s any trouble, I’ll come right to you—you know that. After all, maybe the strangeness is with me rather than with Wade. All my other hands are so much like family here, maybe I’m just not used to a ... a ... Wade Stuart. Maybe I’m just being silly. Let it go, OK? At least for now.”
“If you say so. At least for now.”
They stood together near the rail in front of the house where Ben had hitched his tall stallion, Snorty. The moonlight was soft, diffused by the humidity in the air. Bats swooped about almost invisibly, gorging themselves on the mosquitoes and other insects in the air. Laughter, rich and warm, floated from the bunkhouse. Ben tightened the cinch of his saddle and wiped his hands on his denim pants, turning to face Lee. He extended his hand, and she took it.
“I had a real nice evening, Lee. Thanks.”
Their hands stayed together a heartbeat longer than was required for the sake of courtesy.
“Thanks for coming,” Lee said as their hands parted. “And about that other thing we discussed—don’t worry. All right?”
Ben stepped into his stirrup and smiled. “Worryin’s my job.”
Lee watched the marshall ride off, then stared into the night long after she could no longer see him.
The next morning, both a quick, drenching rain and Jonas Dwyer showed up at the Busted Thumb Horse Farm. A dapper man of sixty or so, Jonas was well dressed as always, revealing his age only by the snowy whiteness of his hair and the weather-scribed lines on his broad face. His body was barrel shaped and hard with muscle, his legs were rather short, and his head appeared to sit directly on his shoulders, without benefit of a neck. His operation, Dwyer Horses and Cattle, encompassed eight hundred acres about fifty miles north of Burnt Rock.
“Whoa!” Jonas sputtered as he wiped the rain from his face with a white handkerchief when Lee met him at her front door’s small porch. “Ain’t this a toadchoker!”
“Jonas,” Lee laughed. “Come in, come in! It’s so good to see you!”
Jonas stepped inside and extended his hand to Lee. “Always good to see you too, Lee,” he said, smiling. Lee stepped past his hand and embraced her old friend warmly, soaked duster and all. Despite his wet clothes, he smelled as he always did—of barber’s bay rum, good leather, and pipe tobacco. Lee eased back from him, her
hands still on his shoulders.
“I don’t get to do that often enough, Jonas,” she said. “I don’t see why you have to be such a stranger.”
“Me a stranger? When’s the last time you sat at my table, Lee Morgan? Don’t you have at least one of those pups you raise that’ll carry you to my place without caving in?”
“Sometimes I wonder,” Lee laughed. “Take off that duster—we’ll have coffee and biscuits in the kitchen.” She took his hand. “Please remember me to Margaret. She’s been in my prayers. Has there been any change at all?”
Jonas shook his head. “Some days are better’n others. You know how she’s been since we lost Stephen. Now the doc says she has some kinda disease that makes older folks confused and forgetful. An’ she’s takin’ an awful lot of this medicine she says helps her. But she’s a good woman, an’ she’s put up with my nonsense for better’n thirty-five years. I owe her at least that many years of care and love.”
Jonas settled himself into the chair closest to the stove and mopped his face with his handkerchief once again. Lee gathered up mugs, plates, and biscuits from the warmer atop the stove, then took a large crock of peach preserves from a cupboard and put it and a butter knife on the table in front of Jonas. After she poured the coffee, she placed a mounded plate of warm biscuits within reach of them both.
Jonas closed his eyes and drew a long breath through his nose. “I can’t imagine a finer smell to a man who’s been ridin’ since well before the sun,” he said. “I spent the night at Linc Grummond’s ranch and lit out early.” He opened his eyes and reached toward the plate. He carefully spread peach preserves on the biscuit like a mason spreading mortar, then took a bite that consumed half the treat.
“How has your stock weathered the summer?” Lee asked, stirring honey into her coffee.
Jonas swallowed. “Good. I lost a couple of nice mares to a slew of cottonmouths they stumbled into in a wash, and a few longhorns to rustlers that hit me one night, but everything’s good. My foals are growin’ like weeds in a garden. Maybe if they’d quit playin’ in the lower twenty acres outside my office window, I might even get some work done. They’re somethin’ to gawk at, Lee. I was always partial to a foal, ya know.”