Petticoat Ranch (21 page)

He saw a rawhide rope that had old Moses’s fine braiding about it, and a single pearl-handled pistol that also belonged to the elderly man, who had been the steady one of the foursome.

Then Adam saw his own blanket rolled up behind another saddle. It could have been another blanket, nothing special about it. But the bloodstains settled it in Adam’s mind. Couldn’t this lynching party even count? They’d stolen the outfits from four men, but they’d only hanged three.

Adam’s fury built until it was all he could do to stop himself from leaping from cover and begin killing. He’d grab the last one, take his rifle, and empty it into the lot of them, grabbing another rifle from a fallen man when his was empty.

But he held himself frozen. He’d die with a plan like that. But it would feel good every last second of his life.

Then he thought of dying that way, in a killing rage, and finally that gave him the strength to hold his hiding place. God had blinded their eyes to the obvious. Maybe he’d survived for some reason of God’s. Maybe he’d done something right to earn him a few more years here on this earth. More likely, he was alive because Sophie needed him.

Adam let the men go. What other choice did he have? But he counted twenty of them, and he risked his life to see a few faces. Then he noticed the brand. . . .

J B
AR
M.

T 
W E L V E
             

L
uther rode steadily into the night, with Buff galloping relentlessly by his side. They could make Texas before they slept, if they kept up their pace. But the closer Texas got, the bigger it loomed.

A distant pinpoint of light had them both pulling up.

“Coffee’d taste almighty good ’bout now, Buff. Whataya say?”

Buff grunted, and they headed slowly for the light. The fire was miles away. They knew from reading signs, they were riding into the camp of a herd being pushed up the trail rather than into a bunch of outlaws.

They weren’t afraid of being shot by no-accounts now. They were afraid of being shot by law-abiding men.

Before they got within shooting range, Luther hollered out, “Hello, the camp!”

A voice out of the darkness called, “Ride in easy.”

They heard the clicks of a dozen rifles being cocked.

Buff and Luther knew how to approach a cow camp, and the drovers knew how to hold their fire until it was needed. Within minutes, the two were settled in with coffee, biscuits, and beans. The fire crackled, and the scent of boiled coffee and mesquite wood soothed Luther’s edgy nerves. He hoped it was working on everyone here. The
clink
of the coffeepot on the tin cups melded with the soft lowing of a cow out on the range and made Luther feel right at home.

Every cowhand in the group had left his bedroll and joined the newcomers at the fire. A cowboy was always hungry for news and a different
voice than the few he heard all day every day for weeks and months on end. And cowboys were a friendly lot. But Luther knew, the cowpokes came to the fire mostly to help with the shooting if there was trouble.

“Huntin’ work?” the trail boss asked. “We can always use a few more men.”

“Headin’ to Texas,” Buff replied.

“Looking for a friend of ours,” Luther added. “Anyone know of a young feller by the name of Clay McClellen?”

One of the drovers said, “I served with a Clay McClellen during the war. We were with Grant up to Shiloh. Then I got stuck in the siege of Vicksburg and lost track of the major. I remember he was always huntin’ news of his brother.”

“Cliff,” Buff said.

Luther nodded. “His twin brother. He hadn’t seen him since they were kids.”

“That’s right,” the young cowboy said. “There was talk of some soldier in the East that looked just like Major McClellen. He was tryin’ to track him down.”

“My last job was scouting for the Texas Rangers. I heard of a Clay McClellen workin’ with the Rangers over some trouble with vigilantes in west Texas,” an old-timer said. “There’s been real bad doin’s along the Pecos. Lotta men hung. Good men along with the bad. Heard McClellen hired on to help out.”

“Why would Clay quit searchin’ for his brother to take a job with the law?” Luther knew Clay wasn’t the type of man to get sidetracked. So if the trail boss had it right, and there weren’t two Clay McClellens, working for the Rangers must have something to do with Cliff.

“Maybe he just needed to make some money along the trail,” one cowboy said reasonably.

Luther exchanged a quick glance with Buff. Clay didn’t need money, not with all the gold his pa had left him.

“Whereabouts in west Texas?” Luther asked.

The old-timer said, “Vigilante trouble is all over the panhandle and
up north almost to Indian territory. The place I heard the name Clay McClellen mentioned was in connection with a little cow town name of Mosqueros.”

Luther drank the last of his boiling hot, inkblack coffee in a single swallow and wiped his hand across his mouth. “Mosqueros,” he said with some satisfaction. He stood up and headed for his horse.

“You oughta stay in camp for the night,” one man offered. “You’d be safer in a crowd, and it’s already mighty late.”

Luther changed his saddle from one of his horses to another they’d picked up along the trail, while Buff did the same.
We might as well ride,
Luther thought.
We’re getting too close to bother with sleep.

“Whereabouts is Mosqueros?” Luther wasn’t a man who had traveled much in his life. He’d come from the East, like everyone else who was in the West, except the Indians. But he’d headed straight up into the peaks of the Rockies like he was kin to the mountain goats. And he’d stayed.

Still, he was a man who’d sat at a lot of campfires, and like all Western men, he listened to talk of the world away from his mountain home. He tucked away information about trails he never figured to trek and rivers he had no notion of ever crossing. He knew a sight about Texas, even though he’d never laid a foot in it.

“If you’re pushing hard,” the trail boss said, “you can be there in four or five days. This herd is out of Lubbock, three days’ ride straight south of here. Mosqueros is another day south.”

Luther said, “We’ll find it.”

“Obliged,” Buff called over his shoulder.

“Five days,” Luther muttered to himself.

“You got something powerful ridin’ you, Luther.”

As powerful as the voice of God.
“Let’s make it in three,” Luther said as he kicked his horse into a ground-eating lope.

Clay was on razor’s edge, trying to track down the men who had taken
a shot at him and Sophie. All the men were working double time, scouting the hills and standing the night watch. Clay had taken the shift before dawn, so he was tired. As he settled into his chair after the noon meal, he sighed with contentment. Good food. Clean house. Pretty wife. Sweet daughters. He was a lucky man.

“Sally, you give me back my underclothes,” Beth screamed.

Sally came running out of her bedroom, with Elizabeth hot on her heels. Beth dove at Sally. Sally dodged out of her reach and darted behind Clay.

“They’re prettier than mine,” Sally shrieked. “They’ve got lace on the tummy and mine don’t. It’s not fair!”

Beth circled Clay’s chair.

A bloodcurdling scream behind his back made Clay jump out of his chair and whirl around just as Beth caught Sally and began pulling up her skirt to take the underclothes back by force. Sally slapped at her sister. Both girls were emitting such high-pitched squeals, Clay thought his ears would bleed. He wanted to shout at them, but he knew they’d cry. He wanted to run out to the bunkhouse, but he knew they’d cry.

Suddenly, something snapped inside him. All his tightly held self-control around the soft-hearted, little monsters blew away in a blaze of anger. “I—want—quiet!”

Sally and Elizabeth froze. Their eyes widened.

“Quiet! Quiet! Quiet!” Out of the corner of his eye, Clay saw Mandy stiffen with fear. Laura, in Mandy’s arms, shoved her fingers in her mouth as if to make herself be quiet. Sophie looked from Clay to the girls fearfully, as if he might start shooting any minute.

It was all too much. He looked back at Sally and Beth. Their eyes were already filling with tears. He stomped his foot in the perfect picture of a man putting his foot down. “You stop that crying right now,” he stormed. “There are going to be some changes around here.”

“Pa,” Sally quavered, “don’t you. . .”

“Don’t you dare ask me if I love you,” Clay roared. “I don’t go lovin’ and stopping lovin’ any time I feel like it. All this means is, I can get
purely perturbed with someone I love, and you all might as well know that now!”

A tear spilled down Beth’s cheek. She nodded as if she were frightened not to agree with him. That just made him madder.

“Stop that cryin’, both of you. I’m not putting up with any more of this screaming and fighting.”

“But, Pa,” Beth said, “we weren’t. . .”

He jabbed his finger at her. “Don’t interrupt me, young lady.”

Beth clamped her mouth shut and shook her head solemnly as if she would never, ever, even under threat of death, interrupt him again.

“There is a right and fittin’ way for folks to get along, and you girls aren’t doin’ it to suit me.” Clay crossed his arms and got his fury under control. He pointed at Mandy and said sternly to Beth and Sally, “Get on the other side of the room with Mandy so I can talk to all of you.”

The girls hurried to obey. They lined up beside Mandy, who was holding the squirming toddler. Sophie went to stand beside them. “Get over here by me, Sophie. This is for the children, and what I say goes for both of us.”

Sophie arched an eyebrow at him, but she walked over and turned to face the girls.

Clay said, “Rule number one: There will be
no more crying
! No more! None! Never!”

“But, Pa, what about my. . .” Beth began.

“I’m not finished yet!” Clay snapped.

Sophie murmured, “A little child can’t always. . .”

Clay turned to her. “I said no more, and I meant it. I can’t stand the sound of womenfolk crying, and I want it stopped.”

Sophie crossed her arms and started tapping her foot. Clay could see she didn’t like minding him. Well, that came as no surprise.

She remained silent, so he forged ahead. “Rule number two: There will be no more taking things that don’t belong to you, without permission!”

Beth turned to Sally and wrinkled her nose at her little sister.

“Rule number three: No more screaming!”

“Rule number four—”

“What about Laura. . .” Mandy interjected.

Clay’s concentration was broken. He was kind of coming up with these rules on the fly, thinking up what would make his home a peaceful one, so he hadn’t rightly decided what to say next anyway. “What about her?”

Mandy asked, “Can Laura cry? ’Cuz sometimes. . .well, she’s pretty little, and she can’t always. . .”

“Laura can cry,” Clay decided. “Until she’s three. Then that’s the end of it.”

“Until she’s three?” Sophie shook her head and stared at Clay as if he’d lost his mind. After an extended silence, she said, “Why three?”

Clay stared at her while he thought about it. Finally, he said, “She’s a baby till she’s three.”

He turned back to the girls. “Rule number—”

“What if we get hurt?” Sally said. “If I stub my toe or get a bee sting. What if—”

“If you’re hurt, you can cry of course. . . .” Clay waved his hand at the interrupting question. “Now, let me get on with setting the rules. Rule number—”

“Why is getting a stubbed toe okay to cry over but not getting my feelings hurt?” Beth interrupted.

Clay plunked his fists on his hips. “Feelings aren’t like getting hurt. Feelings—”

“Yes, they are,” Mandy insisted. “Sometimes my heart hurts worse’n a hundred bee stings. Sometimes—”

“No crying over hurt feelings,” Clay snapped. “Look, if it’s a problem, then how about if you don’t cry when you get hurt either. If you get hurt you just. . .I don’t know. . .say ‘ouch’ or something.”

Sophie said dryly, “ ‘Ouch’—or something?”

Clay pressed on. “You need to learn to control yourselves. If you’re ever in a gunfight or get cornered by a grizzly or some such, you need to be thinking. Having feelings at a time like that can—”