Addie sniffed contemptuously. “And that’s not the only stupid thing he’s done, either. Just the other day he trampled old man Goodloe’s kitchen garden when he was supposed to be investigating the theft of his bull. What are the Goodloes going to eat come winter now? The man’s a catastrophe.”
Charley blinked, surprised. Granted, he didn’t much like the sheriff; he’d not expected him to be quite this incompetent.
“He also refused to arrest the man who killed Billy Pike, even though the blasted outlaw told everybody in town what he aimed to do before he did it.”
“My goodness. That’s really bad.” Charley hadn’t anticipated hearing such a catalogue of sins. He wondered why the people of Rothwell tolerated it.
“He’s not going to be elected again, that’s for sure,” Addie said, answering Charley’s unspoken question. “And if all that wasn’t enough, he’s stupid as the day he was born.”
She looked up at him with soulful eyes. “I mean, imagine him sneakin’ up on an honest fellow cleanin’ out a barn, when a whole gang of vicious criminals is lurkin’ out there, waitin’ for other innocent souls to shoot and rob.”
With a shake of his head, Charley smiled. Well, hell, he thought. It felt good to have little Addie Blewitt on his side. It felt damned good.
# # #
By mid-afternoon, Charley was back to frowning.
First Addie fussed at him until he promised her he’d not work anymore today, but finish the barn tomorrow.
Then, when Lester returned to the farm after buying his sack of flour just in time to nod at Fermin Small as he rode off in a huff, Ivy confiscated him. She fluttered and clucked over Lester until he was beet red and Charley feared for poor Lester’s health. Then the two men were fed a dinner the likes of which Charley had seldom seen. He stared glumly across the table to behold a befuddled Lester, a napkin stuffed up under his chin, and a plate in front of him piled with enough food to feed their entire six-man brass band. Charley figured he looked about as perplexed as poor old Lester did.
Addie chattered through the entire meal. She ran on and on about how gentlemanly he and Lester were. Then she carried on about how horrid Fermin Small was being until Charley wanted to holler at her that Small was right, that Charley Wilde and Lester Frogg were a couple of miserable crooks—probably the only crooks in the neighborhood.
And, if he didn’t already feel like a rotten villain, after dinner Addie made him bathe and rest.
“I won’t hear another single, solitary word from you, Mr. Charley Wilde,” she announced when Charley suggested he finish cleaning up the barn. She demonstrated her reluctance to listen by sticking her fingers into her ears. Charley sighed.
She forced her father’s bathrobe upon him, telling him he’d be more comfortable in a robe than in his trousers and a shirt.
“And anyway, I washed it and rinsed it with lavender water, and ironed it. And if you don’t wear it, then I’ll have gone to all that bother for nothing.” She gave him a pert look to let him know she was teasing, and he felt like a cad. Then she made him put on her father’s slippers. They were too small, but Addie remained undaunted.
“Why, they’re not that bad, Charley,” she said, gazing at his heels sticking out the ends. “And they’ll be ever so much more comfortable on your poor tired feet than those old boots of yours. ‘Sides, I have to brush and polish them; they’re a pure disgrace.”
“My feet aren’t tired, and you don’t have to do anything to my boots.” It was no use. Charley knew it even as he mouthed the words. He, a grown man who had been through war and worse, was utterly helpless in the face of Miss Adelaide Blewitt’s unrelenting kindness.
She made him sit still while she checked his wound. He stared stonily in front of him, forcing himself not to glance at her face or chest. It was a very difficult thing to do. Then she practically pushed him into the parlor, looking as grim as a prison warden.
“You rest now. Tarnation, Charley, how will that arm ever heal if you won’t rest?”
Ultimately, he gave up the struggle. “All right, Miss Adelaide.”
At least she was back to smiling at him when she left him alone in the parlor. There he sat in Martin Blewitt’s easy chair, his feet propped on the ottoman, and stared at the parlor furnishings.
Charley felt mighty low. He’d never felt so idle and useless in his life. So worthless. Worse. He felt as though he were taking iniquitous advantage of two of the nicest women he’d ever met. Because he was. He was too down-hearted even to search the parlor. He still felt low when he drifted off to sleep.
# # #
Addie couldn’t contain her happiness when she discovered her Charley didn’t snore. She’d left him in the parlor, looking sulky as an old bear, while she went back to the kitchen to help Ivy with the washing up. But sulky or not, Charley needed to rest and Addie knew it even if he didn’t.
“A wounded man needs his rest,” she screeched to Ivy as she wiped the dishes.
“He surely does,” her aunt agreed.
Lester, who had been set to peeling potatoes for supper by Ivy, looked at the two of them as though they were dangerous lunatics. Addie only smiled at Lester, causing him to renew his efforts on the potatoes in a hurry.
But Charley had needed his rest, and Addie viewed his slumbering form gladly when she tiptoed into the parlor with a basket of mending later in the afternoon. Charley’d been sleeping for a couple of hours, by her reckoning.
He looked just stunning in the parlor, too; as if he belonged there. Which, of course, he did. Why, when they were married, he’d fill up the empty place her daddy had left behind better than she’d ever dreamed. And he had already begun to fix up the place, too. Life just didn’t seem right without a man around the house. And this one was absolutely perfect.
She heard him stir, lifted her gaze from the sheet she was darning, and smiled. She wanted her Charley to see a happy face when he woke up, after all his hard work this morning. Besides, she had to make him want to stay here. No matter how much she knew he belonged here, if he couldn’t be made to realize it he couldn’t do her much good.
Charley’s head, which had flopped kind of slanty-ways as he slept, righted. Addie shook her head and her heart pitty-patted when she saw his gorgeous black eyelashes flutter against his cheeks. It was a sin for a man to be so good-looking, she thought. He had the prettiest hair, she noticed as it lifted when he drew his fingers through it.
Then he opened his eyes. He focused his fuzzy gaze on Addie. He groaned.
Chapter 5
“Good afternoon, Mr. Sleepy-head,” Addie said brightly.
Aw, shoot. As soon as she spoke, Charley realized he wasn’t still dreaming. Although, he acknowledged bitterly, he didn’t suppose it much mattered. He’d been dreaming about her anyway.
He sat up straighter and bunched the robe up in his lap to disguise his indelicate condition. Addie sat on the sofa in a ray of afternoon sunlight, bright as a new copper penny, her clever little fingers conquering a hole in a sheet just as she had conquered him earlier in the day.
What made it worse was, as soon as he adjusted to being awake, the whole scene felt right to him. Which was decidedly wrong. He had to get those rubies and get out of here. He wished the cattle drive were next week instead of next month. Maybe the band could live on the rubies and forego robbing the bank.
“Do you feel better now, Charley?”
“Um-hum. I guess.”
“See? You needed your sleep, just like I told you.”
“I reckon.”
“Pshaw. Now, you know it’s true, Charley Wilde. You just don’t want to admit it.”
“I guess.”
“Lester told Aunt Ivy that your band will be here around five this afternoon for another rehearsal. He said a couple of the band members have managed to find jobs in town.”
“They have?”
“That’s what he said. I reckon you plan to stay for a while.”
Addie looked at him with s
uch patent hope, Charley couldn’t maintain her gaze, and his glance slid away. “I expect we’ll have to wait until my arm heals before we go to Albuquerque.”
A peek at her face told him his words had disappointed her.
“You’re still going to Albuquerque, then?”
Charley heard the wistfulness in her question and had to quash the impulse to tell her no, he was going to stay right here in Rothwell. With her. Clearing his throat, he managed to mutter, “I guess so.”
“Oh.”
Dejection sang in the syllable, and Charley winced. Making a stab at civility, he said, “How’s Lester doing? Has he died of fright yet?” He forced a smile and was glad to see Addie smile back, even though her eloquent eyes still seemed sad.
“Poor Lester. He ran off after he peeled the potatoes. I don’t know where he is now.”
She giggled and the sweet sound pierced Charley’s emotional armor as effectively as an Apache’s arrow. His heart reacted by throbbing so hard he had to slam his hand over it. Good grief.
He rose suddenly. His head swam and he had to reach for the arm of the chair and brace himself.
“Be careful!”
Addie was beside him in an instant, a steadying hand on his shoulder, her other arm snaking around his waist. Her ripe bosom flattened against his back and he felt her nipples poke into him through the thin material of her dress. Merciful heavens.
“There, now. You see? You’re weaker than you thought you were, Charley. You did need your rest. But what did you do? You went out there in that dusty old barn, getting dirt in your wound, tiring yourself out. I swan.”
Wrenching his mind from baser matters, Charley managed to say, “I expect you’re right, Miss Adelaide.”
And, he did. He’d never known himself to feel so weak. He guessed getting shot took a lot out of a fellow. Nevertheless, he shook her off at the bottom of the stairs, claiming he wasn’t a cripple. Addie, of course, just laughed.
When he made it up the stairs, Charley discovered Lester cowering in a corner of his room. Lester stared at the door when Charley pushed it open and actually whimpered.
“It’s only me, Lester. Ivy’s off doing something else.” Charley grinned when Lester exhaled a gigantic gust of relief and slumped again.
“The Blewitt family has itself some powerful females, I reckon.”
Lester looked almost too exhausted to rise from his slump. He nodded miserably. The two men remained in Charley’s room until the rest of the band showed up.
They had a pretty good rehearsal, though, unmarred by a visit from the sheriff. Charley guessed old Fermin didn’t dare show his long face at the Blewitt place again today.
He forgot to ask Harlan about the cattle drive. He also forgot to give the band an update on the rubies. It felt so good to play his horn again. They hadn’t had an opportunity to play two days in a row since they’d left Georgia.
“I’ll be a wall-eyed toad, Charley, we sound near as good as we done in America City.” Harlan Lewis’s bushy gray whiskers bristled with his grin.
It was Charley’s opinion that if ever a body looked like a bass-player, it was Harlan. He was of medium height, but the rest of him was as square and solid as an oak stump. His bushy gray hair sort of rounded him off on top, the way the rest of him was rounded. Harlan wasn’t fat, exactly, he just resembled his horn. They went together.
“We’re better than we ever was on ‘War,’” Peachy Gilbert announced solemnly. He dabbed an eye with his handkerchief and Charley and Harlan looked away politely.
Charley’s arm hurt like a horse had kicked it, but he couldn’t drum up much concern about it. It had felt so damned good to be playing again.
“I was talkin’ to the blacksmith in town, Charley,” Harlan said after he carefully packed his bass horn in its case.
“That so?”
“Says he might be able to use me fer a day or two.” Harlan peered at Charley hopefully. “So, that’s good, huh, Charley? It’s all right if’n I kin get me a real job fer a day or two, ain’t it?”
Charley looked up from packing his own horn away. “Why, of course, Harlan. Why wouldn’t it be?”
Harlan stubbed his toe into the hay on the barn floor and looked sheepish. “Well, you know, since we begun to do—well—you know—other things fer a livin’ and all, I didn’t know if it was all right to work no more.”
Charley patted Harlan on the back. “Harlan, if you can find yourself a real job, that’s wonderful. That’s what we all want anyway, isn’t it?”
“Well, but I thought we was gonna be rob—”
Charley hit him again, harder, and Harlan’s sentence ended in a whuff of expelled air.
“The best thing that could happen to us would be if we could all find jobs in a town somewhere, boys,” Charley said loudly, just in case Harlan regained his breath before he did his thought processes. “We just want to stick together, is all. Don’t want to bust up the band.”
“Oh.” Harlan looked relieved. “Sure. That’s right. We don’t want to bust up the band.”
“That’s right, Harlan. We’ve been together since before the war, boys,” Charley added, in case Harlan took it into his head to talk some more. “We sure don’t want to break up now. Why, we owe it to those of us who didn’t survive to stick together.”
The six remaining members of the America City Brass Band looked serious and a little sad, and nodded in agreement. A few moments of silence ensued. Peachy wiped his eyes again.
“Do you ‘spect we might could try that Fire-Water Music by that Handy feller again one o’ these days, Charley?” Francis Whatley spoke into the quiet. Francis, one of the more ambitious of the band members, looked at Charley with an expression approaching fervor.
“‘Music for the Royal Fireworks?’” Charley smiled fondly at Francis. They’d played Handel’s masterwork once in America City when a big-city orchestra visited. It had been a thrilling night for all of them. “I don’t know, Francis. We might not be able to do it without some strings to back us up. Besides, I don’t have the sheet music anymore.”
“Oh.” Francis’s face fell and Charley felt as though he’d just kicked a dog.
“It’s a good idea, though,” he said to cheer Francis up. “It’s a real good idea. Maybe someday we can play it again.”
Francis brightened fractionally. “I reckon,” he said as though he didn’t believe it.
Neither did Charley, and he sighed when a wave of almost oppressive sadness washed over him. Hell. Life used to be so grand, back when he was a young buck in America City. When he played “Wood Up Quick Step,” the girls would just about swoon.
And every Sunday, his ma and pa and little sister would come to the park to listen to the band. They’d been so proud of him. Charley shook his head again, trying to dislodge memories almost too painful to bear.
“Tell you what, Francis. I’m going to do everything I can to see us set up somewhere. Some place where we can play on Sundays again, and back up a big-city orchestra if it ever comes to town.” Francis looked at him as though he were the Oracle at Delphi. Charley, touched, felt compelled to add, “Shoot, maybe we won’t even need the strings. Maybe I can work us up a brass band arrangement for ‘Music for the Royal Fireworks.’”
He felt like a new father when Francis smiled.
“Thanks, Charley,” Francis said softly. “Thanks. That’d be just grand.”
A moment later Charley saw a look of pure horror settle onto Lester’s face, and he turned toward the barn door. Only one thing in his experience could make Lester look like that.
Sure enough, Ivy Blewitt strode toward the band through the open barn door. It looked as though she was armed with a plate of freshly made doughnuts today. Addie followed Ivy, bearing a tray holding a pitcher of apple cider and a stack of tin cups.
“Take it easy, Lester,” Charley whispered when Lester sagged against the wall and turned green.
“You boys sounded so good, we just couldn’t let you go ba
ck to town hungry,” Addie said.
Her smile lit up the dusty, evening-darkened barn. Charley decided it was time to brush up on “Wood Up Quick Step.” He hadn’t played it since they left America City. He wondered if Addie Blewitt would swoon for him.
“Thank you, Miss Adelaide and Miss Ivy.”
Addie set her tray down and began pouring cider. The boys lined up in a tidy row. Each one took a tin cup of cider and a doughnut and bobbed his thanks.
“I swan, Charley,” Addie sighed a half-hour or so later as she waved the last of the America City Brass Band out of the farmyard. “I think Aunt Ivy and I must be the luckiest females in New Mexico Territory to have your band practicin’ in our barn.”
“Glad you like it.” Charley stood next to her at the gate, but his eyes were not directed at his departing comrades, as were hers. No. He only had eyes for Addie Blewitt. The fact aggravated him.
When she heaved a big, happy sigh, his fingers curled up until his nails dug into his palms. He wanted to kiss her. He wanted to kiss her so bad, he hurt.
Lord, Lord. He had to get away from her. This was torture.
Addie had no notion of the effect she had on him. With another deep sigh, she turned and took his arm to walk him back towards the house.
“I reckon we’d best get you and Lester some supper. You must be hungry, after all that beautiful music you played this afternoon.”
“Hungry?”
“Why, of course. My aunt Ivy says gentlemen need lots of nourishment to keep up their strength.”
“She does, does she?” Charley contemplated the huge breakfast and gigantic dinner he’d eaten, as well as the two fresh doughnuts he’d just consumed. He wondered just what Addie expected he and Lester did during a typical day to require so much fuel.
“Oh, my, yes. Aunt Ivy knows just what gentlemen need.”
He inspected her upturned face for irony and didn’t detect a drop. “Your aunt has a lot of experience with the men, does she?”
“Why, Charley Wilde, what a thing to ask! My aunt Ivy is a maiden lady and as pure as the snow!”
Confused, Charley stammered, “But, you said she know what men need.”
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