Hard Country Read online

  Cal touched his hat brim as he stepped to the stove. “Good morning, Colonel.”

  Fountain turned. A muscular man with a high forehead and wide-spaced eyes, he was clean shaven except for a neatly trimmed mustache. Fountain smiled. “Good day to you, sir.”

  “What brings you to Tularosa?” Cal asked.

  “Young Henry and I are on our way home to Las Cruces from Lincoln.”

  “There’s more snow sure to come before nightfall.”

  “I believe you’re right,” Fountain replied. “We’ll stay over tonight in La Luz. Have you seen anything of Oliver Lee and his friends in town?”

  “Can’t say I have,” Cal replied. “Are you looking to find those lads?”

  “Not yet,” Fountain said, forcing a smile. “Come, Henry, pick out some hard candy and let’s be on our way.”

  “Have a safe trip home,” Cal said.

  Fountain gave him a quizzical look. “Yes, by all means.”

  Cal sought out the proprietor’s wife, who was busy arranging notions and fabrics on a table near a display of women’s fashions.

  “Do you recall that young woman in here with me this morning?” he asked.

  “Yes, of course I do,” the woman replied.

  “Would you help me pick out an outfit or two for her?”

  “Certainly. What would you like for her?”

  “Nothing fancy,” Cal replied. “She’s pretty enough as is. Something she’d enjoy wearing every day. And can you wrap it up nice?”

  “With pleasure.”

  After half an hour with the woman’s expert help, Cal left the store with a parcel tied with a pretty red ribbon under his arm. In it were two dresses and some undergarments the proprietor’s wife had picked out.

  With the storm approaching, he hurried back to Ignacio’s casa, covered the loaded wagon with a tarp, and fed the team some oats just as the first flakes began to fall. Inside, he put the parcel on the table in front of Emma.

  “What’s this?” she asked, as Ignacio, Teresa, and their children gathered around.

  “Open it,” Cal said.

  Emma handed Molly to Teresa, carefully untied the ribbon, and peeled back the paper. “Oh, my,” she said, her fingers caressing the fabric. Her eyes were bright and wet as she stood and held a dress in front of her. “Oh, my.”

  “Maybe you should court her, my amigo,” Ignacio said.

  “Watch what you say, old pard,” Cal cautioned.

  Ignacio belly laughed as Emma swirled across the room with the new dress pressed against her body.

  She stopped and looked at Cal. For an instant she was no longer a bold, fiercely independent woman, but just a delighted, charming young lady brimming with pleasure.

  “I never…,” she stammered before throwing herself into his arms. “You are the sweetest man.”

  Cal gave her a small hug and pushed her away. “Now, I’ve told you before, give over that kind of talk.”

  She gave him a quick kiss on the cheek and danced away.

  * * *

  Two days after their return to the ranch, on a clear, cool, early morning, Patrick confronted Cal as he climbed down from the windmill.

  “Do you want her for yourself, old man?” he asked.

  “What are you all puffed up about?” Cal asked as he crossed toward the barn, grease can in hand, Patrick at his heels.

  “You know damn well what it is,” Patrick spat, “buying her dresses and all. She told me.”

  “That girl needed some new duds and I made her a present. Nothing more to it than that.”

  “You’ve got no hankering for her?” Patrick demanded.

  “If I were young and inclined to want to settle down with a woman, I’d pay my respects to her, hat in hand,” Cal replied as he stowed the grease can on a shelf in the barn. “But I’m neither young nor the marrying kind.”

  “So you do fancy her,” Patrick said, half snarling.

  Cal grabbed a rag and wiped his hands. “What man wouldn’t? But I ain’t standing in your way or trying to queer your play.”

  “You expect me to believe that?”

  “Why is it you can’t see the honest truth when it’s told to you straight out? If you want to call me a liar, we can knock each other’s ears down right here and now.”

  Patrick backed up a step. “I ain’t looking for a fight.”

  “Good,” Cal said on his way to the saddle shed. “You’ve been mooning over Emma for nigh onto a year, and it’s about time you stopped being flummoxed by her.”

  “I ain’t confused at all.”

  “Like hell you ain’t.” Cal grabbed his tack and started for the corral, where his pony waited. “I know you don’t like to take advice, but here’s some for you anyway: Go tell that girl what you want, listen to what she wants, and see if you two can cinch something up together.”

  “I’ve already done that.”

  “Do it again and be nice about it,” Cal said as he entered the corral with his tack. Bandit, his pony, trotted over. “You got all day and night to get it done, with no one around. I don’t think we lost any stock in the storm, but it’s best to prowl around and check. George is on his way to Big Sheep, and I’m headed to North Canyon. We’ll be back tomorrow. Go talk to that gal.”

  “All right,” Patrick said. “Maybe I will.”

  Cal blew on the bit to warm it, put it in Bandit’s mouth, secured his saddlebags and scabbard, mounted, and smiled down at Patrick. “Way I see it, Emma has been real good medicine for you. Buena suerte.”

  He rode out of the corral and broke Bandit into a trot. Behind him, he heard the gate swing closed. He’d finally said his piece to Patrick. He hoped some of it had sunk in.

  * * *

  While Molly slept soundly, Emma cleaned the ashes out of the cookstove, brought in more wood, and scrubbed the kitchen floor. When she finished, she washed her face in a basin of hot water, sat at the kitchen table, and brushed her long, thick hair with slow strokes, the feel of it pleasant and soothing.

  Cal and George had ridden away earlier in the day, and Patrick was still in the corral working with one of the horses he was training. Usually when he was with the ponies he came in for a midmorning cup of coffee, knowing she always kept a fresh pot ready. Today she’d yet to hear his footsteps. She emptied the basin of water outside and paused to watch him for a minute. He reined the pony from a canter to a quick stop and trotted it around the corral. He bent low over the pony’s neck, patting and talking to it before dismounting. She found it mystifying that he was gentle and patient with animals and so sharp and irritable with people.

  She was about to wave and call to him that fresh coffee was ready when Molly started crying. She changed the baby’s dirty diaper and nursed her for a time before Patrick stomped into the kitchen.

  He nodded, crossed to the stove, poured his coffee, and sat across from her at the table.

  “Molly’s getting big,” he said after taking a swallow. “How long a time before she stops nursing?” He had no idea how long it took but thought once it stopped maybe Emma might show more interest in him.

  Emma looked at him with surprise. It was unlike him to comment about Molly at all. “Another year or so.”

  “That’s good, I guess,” Patrick said, falling silent. He wet his lips, ran a finger around the rim of his cup, and said in a rush, “I know I’m not much for courting, but I’m thinking we should get married.”

  Emma looked at him without changing her expression.

  “Well?” he prodded.

  “Will you hear me out and not get riled by what I have to say?” Emma asked.

  “Are you turning me down?” Patrick asked, ready to hate what he might hear.

  “You’re starting up already,” Emma replied evenly. “Will you hear me out?”

  Patrick shifted uneasily in the chair. “I will.”

  “Promise?”

  “Okay,” he said. Across the table, a milk bubble formed on Molly’s lips and she burped.


  “You can have me,” Emma said, patting Molly’s back, “but I will not marry you yet.”

  Patrick’s eyebrows went up. “Why not?”

  “We can live as man and wife for now.”

  “I ain’t good enough to marry?”

  “I won’t be owned by any man.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  “I won’t be bossed around, tied up and locked in a room, or forced to do whatever a man wants. You can have no rights over me.”

  “I’m not like that,” he replied, half believing his words.

  “If you ever force yourself on me, raise a hand to me or Molly, come to our bed drunk and dirty, I will leave. If you ever lie to me, steal from me, or treat me like a servant or a whore, I’ll leave. Those are my terms.”

  “You got this all figured out, don’t you?” Patrick said.

  Emma nodded. “If you don’t like it, walk away.”

  “You ain’t never gonna marry me?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  Patrick stared at her. He didn’t know what he meant to her and probably never would. She seemed to take him as he was and wasn’t frightened of him at all. He liked that. There was a part of her he didn’t understand, but he knew it was as tough as rawhide. Maybe even dangerous.

  He’d thought about all of this every day for a year, trying to shake her off and be done with her. But all he could think of was being with her, pressed belly to belly, her legs wrapped around him, her dark hair coiled in his fingers, lips on lips, his hands exploring every inch of her warm body.

  “I ain’t walking away,” he finally said.

  “Tonight, after Molly goes to sleep, you can visit me. Take a bath before you come.”

  “Tonight, then,” Patrick said.

  “Yes,” Emma replied with a small smile, wondering if he would kiss her before he climbed on her. If he did not, it would be dreadful.

  38

  In the morning, Cal and George met up on the trail back to the ranch, and after exchanging the happy news of the good condition of the stock at Big Sheep and North Canyon, they rode together in comfortable silence under a razor-sharp blue February sky.

  All was quiet upon their arrival, with no sign of Patrick, Emma, or Molly. Cuidado, Patrick’s pony, loitered in the pasture with the other horses, and the wagon was parked in the barn, causing George to worry.

  “Something ain’t right,” he said as he slid out of the saddle. “None of the corral chores have been done, and this is Emma’s wash day and there ain’t no clothes on the line. Besides that, the wagon is here, Patrick’s pony is here, and there’s not a sound to be heard or person to be seen.”

  “Rein it in,” Cal replied.

  “Well then, where the hoot is everybody?” George countered. “What’s going on?”

  “Let’s get these ponies brushed, watered, and fed,” Cal replied, nodding toward the casita, “and take our good time doing it.”

  The worried look on George’s face faded into a grin. “You ain’t saying…”

  “I’m hoping,” Cal replied.

  “I’ll be damned,” George chuckled. “If Patrick’s done cinched her up, it will sure make it a lot easier around here on us old boys.”

  “Amen,” Cal replied.

  They looked after their ponies with great, deliberate care and turned them loose in the pasture just as Deputy Sheriff Tito Barela rode up.

  “What brings you out here, Tito?” Cal asked. Built low to the ground, Tito had a chubby face and sunny disposition that belied his toughness.

  “Colonel Fountain and his son Henry are missing,” Tito replied. “A stage driver who met the colonel on the road said three horsemen were following Fountain. He was carrying grand jury indictments against Oliver Lee and his sidekicks for cattle larceny and defacing brands.” Tito slid off his pony.

  “I saw Fountain in Tularosa on his way home,” Cal said, “and he asked me if Lee and his amigos were in town.”

  “Did he say anything about being followed?” Tito asked.

  Cal shook his head. “Nope. How sure are you about foul play?”

  “There were bloodstains and many horse tracks where the wagon left the road, and we found one of the colonel’s horses and his buckboard miles to the east, his papers missing, everything scattered about.”

  “Bad business,” Cal said.

  “It’s a big tumulto,” Tito said. “Posses are out looking for the bodies, big rewards have been raised, and people are demanding the arrest of Lee and his compadres for murder. There’s talk of a lynching when they’re brought in.”

  Tito held out a star. “The sheriff wants you back on the job. I’m to bring you to Las Cruces pronto.”

  Cal hesitated. He wasn’t about to go galloping off to do the sheriff’s bidding without first knowing if Patrick and Emma had cinched up.

  “You go on ahead,” he said as he took the star from Tito’s hand. “Tell the sheriff I’ll be there in a couple of days.”

  Tito nodded and threw a leg up on his pony. “Adios.”

  “So long,” Cal replied.

  “I thought you weren’t gonna be a lawman anymore,” George said as Tito rode away.

  “Well, curiosity has got the best of me, I reckon,” Cal said with a slow grin. “Besides, we can always use the money, and between you and Patrick, I know things will get looked after around here.”

  He slapped George on the back. “I’m hungry. Let’s get a cup of coffee and see if there are any victuals warming on the stove.”

  * * *

  Patrick eased into the kitchen, poured a cup of coffee, and joined Cal and George at the table, where the men were mopping up the last of their bowls of stew with slices of Emma’s homemade bread. Both nodded howdy but didn’t say a word.

  “Did we lose any stock from the storm?” Patrick finally asked.

  “Didn’t find any carcasses,” Cal said, giving Patrick a once-over. His hair was mussed and he looked more relaxed than anytime Cal could recall since he returned home. Also, he was clean shaven and smelled like soap. “Our tallies at Big Sheep and North Canyon were about right.”

  “Maybe a wolf or bear took one or two of the yearlings,” George said. “That’s about all we lost.”

  “And we’re gonna have some good grass up there come spring,” Cal noted as he went to the stove for the coffeepot. “But we need to start moving the cattle to new pastures real soon.”

  “Who came to visit?” Patrick asked.

  “Tito Barela.” Cal refilled his cup and passed the pot to George. “Seems Albert Fountain and his youngest son were bushwhacked on their way home from Lincoln. Posses are out looking for their bodies. Oliver Lee and some of his boys are suspects.”

  He took the star out of his shirt pocket. “I’ve been asked to ride for the law again. I’ll leave in the morning. Now that you’ve dropped your rope on Emma, mind if George moves back into your old room? I’m tired of having him bunk with me anyway.”

  “That’s okay by me,” Patrick replied, coloring slightly.

  “Bueno.” Cal stood, drained his coffee, and juggled the badge in his hand. “Best I get my outfit together. Can’t go chasing cabrons unshucked.”

  “How long will you be gone?” Patrick asked.

  “Don’t know,” Cal replied, “but it would sure be nice if you could have some of them cow ponies ready to sell when I get back. That’s if you can find the time.”

  “Want to make that a bit plainer?” Patrick asked, holding back a grin.

  “No need, from the looks of it,” Cal said with a smile.

  George pushed back his chair and chuckled at Patrick. “You look a little peaked, old son, like you’re coming down with something. Better rest up today. See if Emma has a remedy you can take. I’ll look after the chores that need doing.”

  “I swear someday when Cal’s not around I’m gonna fire you,” Patrick said, suppressing a smile.

  “I know it,” George replied.

  “And I’ll hire him
right back,” Cal announced.

  “I know that too,” George said, pulling his work gloves on as he headed for the door.

  “In case you don’t know it, that old boy there is a friend of yours,” Cal said after George was gone.

  “I’m beginning to get a glimmer of that idea,” Patrick replied.

  * * *

  Patrick moved out of his room and George didn’t waste any time taking it over when he finished doing chores. Cal packed his bedroll and saddlebags thinking he and George might soon be sharing the casita if Patrick and Emma got busy making babies. Cal liked the notion of the house someday filled with children. It would be a tribute to all that John Kerney had wanted for his son.

  He spread an oilcloth on his bed and got out his artillery. He would take a shotgun, a rifle, two pistols, a Bowie knife, and enough ammunition to get through a daylong gunfight if necessary. When you wore a star you had to expect to go to war.

  He was cleaning his shotgun when Emma appeared in the open door, wearing one of the dresses Cal had given her. Unlike Patrick, she seemed no different than before, which came as no surprise. From what Cal had observed, women quickly returned to their ordinary selves after they’d given themselves to a man, until the next time, when it happened all over again. It was a mystery he hadn’t quite figured out.

  “Patrick told me,” she said. “I’ll miss you.”

  Cal put the shotgun down and gave her a good look-see. There was no sign that she’d been mistreated, and she seemed calm and collected. “I shouldn’t be gone all that long,” he replied. “Are you doing all right, missy?”

  Emma nodded and smiled. “I’m fine.”

  “You’re staying on, then?”

  “I’m staying.”

  “Good.”

  “Will you do me a favor?”

  “What’s that?” Cal asked.

  “When you’re in town, buy me two pairs of boys’ pants.” She held out a piece of paper and some silver coins. “I wrote down the size to get. They won’t fit exactly, but I’ll alter them.”

  “For you, are they?” Cal asked, taking the coins and the paper from her hand.