Liz Ireland (10 page)

Blushing furiously, she looked away. It was absurd to imagine her life as anything half as romantic as a poem. Her existence was about how much whiskey she could sell. But, oh, it was fun to dream sometimes, to let her imagination run wild!

Will followed her gaze. Both their lines of vision stumbled onto Trip, who had found Feather but was having a little trouble catching the horse, which shied away from him when he made a grab for her mane. The movement sent Trip stumbling in the half light, and he fell face forward to the ground.

Paulie smiled. But Will, still looking at Trip, dropped her arm, his face solemn.

“For a minute I forgot,” he said, his voice sounding almost disappointed as he walked away.

Paulie took a few moments to take his words in. Why, Will had seemed almost jealous that she cared for Trip.

Jealous,
she thought, a smile touching her lips again. In a few seconds it seemed as if the world had become a million times brighter—which in fact it had. The sun had
risen enough to cast its first rays over the land, and she stumbled forward again to look for her horse, feeling as suddenly hopeful as if there were rays of sunshine sparking out of her fingers and toes.

She knew Will was still intent on finding Mary Ann, and heaven knew what would happen between him and Oat after they reached San Antonio. But there was something in him that was envious of her relationship with Trip. Maybe he was used to being the one she joked most with, or looked to for advice. He seemed to resent that she would look more to another man—and that another man would have more influence over her than he did.

If so, his attitude toward her wasn’t nearly so clean cut as he tried to make out. He wanted to be the one who was most protective of her, which might explain a lot of his peculiar behavior. His bossiness, for instance—and the way he’d insulted her until she was ready to turn tail and run back to Possum Trot.

Not that she would be going back there now. Her smile broadened.

A man who cared that much for her couldn’t
really
want to be rid of her, could he?

“T
he road to Possum Trot’s that way,” Will said, nodding toward a horizon filled with little else but hill after hill of rock and scrub brush.

Paulie nodded and grinned. “Is it?”

Partner curved his neck as he bent gracefully to drink of the water in the creek where they had stopped for a midmorning break. After they had found their horses, they had decided it would be most prudent to sleep for an hour or two before setting out again. Will worried about Paulie’s ribs, and especially about Oat, who was looking more haggard than usual after their ordeal. His skin had had an almost gray cast to it, though the catnap had put a little color in his cheeks again.

Despite his worries, Paulie was obviously feeling as fit as a fiddle again, even after riding three hours with her ribs wrapped. She was also smiling as if she were harboring some devilish little secret.

“We can swing by and drop you off,” Will offered.

“There’s no need for that.”

Will tilted his head, feeling a premonition of trouble at her alarmingly vague response. Did she mean that he didn’t need to drop- her off because she could remember the
way…or because she had no intention of being dropped anywhere?

She hummed a jaunty tune to herself, answering his question for him.

“Oh, no,” he moaned, burying his forehead in one of his hands.

Paulie flashed him a dazzling smile and tossed the simple braid she’d fashioned her hair into over one shoulder. “Don’t be so glum, Will. You’ll be glad to have me along, I swear it.”

“You mean you’re not going home?”

“Nope.”

He tossed up his hands in frustration. “I distinctly remember you being madder than a wet hen and announcing that you couldn’t get away from me and back to Possum Trot soon enough.”

She shrugged negligently. “I was just mad.”

He sighed. “Usually you’re a little more adept at staying mad.”

Her green eyes flashed at him in their old good-natured way. “I’ve grown up, Will. Now when I’m mad at someone, I try to look at things from the other fellow’s point of view.”

“Uh-oh.” He didn’t want to imagine the motives Paulie could start ascribing to him if she was in a mood to be analytical.

“You’re not so hard to figure out, Will,” she told him, plunging right in despite his lack of encouragement. “Once I started examining the situation, it all became clear. You were
too
eager to be rid of me.”

“That’s right!” he agreed, jumping in before she could go any further. “I was hoping you’d go back to Possum Trot so I wouldn’t have to put up with you anymore.”

She crossed her arms. “But only because you were worried
about me after our encounter with Night Bird. You just wanted me out of harm’s way. You knew I would never agree to give up the search while you all were still at it, so you tried to insult me into going home.”

He couldn’t speak. He was stunned at how quickly and completely she had found him out.

Paulie beamed triumphantly. “You’re pretty sneaky, I’ll grant you that.”

And she was pretty crafty when it came to figuring him out.

Her smile slowly dissipated. “But you didn’t need to be
quite
so insulting, you know,” she said, more hotly. “I only wanted to help you.”

He shook his head. “I know. You always just want to help.”

“Well, heck—it wasn’t my fault that we got caught. And you can’t say that I hurt things any by being there.”

No, except that the thought of something happening to her scared the hell out of him. “Well, I suppose we’re out of danger now, mostly.”

Her face brightened. “You mean you want me to stay with you?”

“No, I just realize that I can’t stop you any more than an ant could stop the transcontinental railway.”

She laughed. “You might say you couldn’t stop me any more than I could stop you from going to San Antonio.”

His smile faded. “If you’ve got reservations, you’d better tell me about them now.”

She rubbed her hands together uncomfortably. “Well, you’ve got to admit, Will, Mary Ann hasn’t been kidnapped. Have you ever stopped to think that you’re looking for a woman who doesn’t want to be found?”

He bit his lip, considering. He hadn’t ruminated too much about what Mary Ann had up her sleeve when she
left home. He assumed she was just tired of living with Oat and regretted marrying him. Was it so hard to understand her. running away under those circumstances?

“I’ll bet she doesn’t know what she wants.”

Paulie shot him a doubtful stare. “Mary Ann was born knowing what she wanted. Why should you waste your time going after her because she ran off with some goodfor-nothing?”

Will’s jaw clenched in response to her assertion. “We aren’t certain that’s what happened.”

“Night Bird said—”

He nearly howled. “You’re willing to take the word of a criminal?”

“What reason would he have to lie?”

Her question didn’t hold much water with Will. “I’m going to San Antonio to find her, whether or not you and Trip and even Oat want to come along.”

“Okay, don’t get your dander up,” Paulie said. “Of course I’ll come along—I’m not saying you’re right, but I’m coming along.”

“Sometimes people need to be saved from their own stupid decisions,” he said. “It’s no shame to make a mistake. If Gerald were alive, he’d try to find her.”

“Yeah, but it would have been his place to. He was her father.”

Will felt his jaw tense. “I made a promise to Gerald that I would look after her, and I intend to keep it. Besides, we don’t know for sure that she’s. with that Tyler fellow.”

Paulie kept silent on that question. “I guess we’re going to San Antonio, then,” she announced.

Paulie took great comfort that the rest of the party was as skeptical as she was about their mission. No one argued with Will about chasing after a woman who didn’t want to
be caught, but then again, he made it pretty clear that his mind was made up.

Surprisingly, the one most resistant to the next leg of the trip was Oat. As they stopped that night, weary after their long day of uninterrupted riding, he collapsed by their fire, a blanket wrapped around him, and contemplated finding his wife.

“Could be the Injun was right,” he said, recalling Night Bird’s observation that Mary Ann was better off in San Antonio than back in Possum Trot with Oat. “Maybe it’s best.”

“You mean you want to give up on her?” Will asked sharply.

Oat’s bloodshot eyes widened. “No. Heck, no. But if she don’t want to come home…Well, it ain’t like we had a real marriage anyways.”

Three heads snapped to attention and turned from the fire to focus solely on Oat. “What do you mean?” Paulie asked. Will shot her a sharp glance, but she didn’t care. If Oat was going to come out with such tantalizing assertions, he had to expect a little prying.

The old man wrapped the blanket a little more tightly around his shoulders and shrugged. “Well, it ain’t like we was a real husband and wife…in that way, you know. Mary Ann wasn’t interested in affection.”

Trip blinked in confusion. “Well heck, Oat, what was she interested in?”

Oat sighed. “Dunno.”

For all his scolding her for questioning the man on the nature of his marriage, Will seemed too frustrated by Oat’s vagueness to let the subject drop. “What exactly brought you two together?”

“Mary Ann did,” Oat said quickly, as if there were no doubt in his mind. “Not that I cared. She’s a right pretty
girl. Used to pass her house and think to myself, ‘Now that’s a right pretty girl.’ Then I’d move on, ‘cause it always seemed she wouldn’t. look twice at an old whiskey man. She never did, that I can remember. Till that one day.”

Paulie, Will and Trip leaned forward, waiting to find out precisely what events occurred on
that one day.
Unfortunately, Oat chose that juncture to fill his pipe, which took all of his attention for a few minutes.

As soon as he had the darn thing lit, Paulie jumped right in. “So what happened?”

Oat shrugged. “Well, I’ll tell ya’. I just drove right by her house one day, and a few minutes later I heard someone yellin’ after me. And when I turned around, there she was, runnin’ down the road after me. Called me Mr. Murphy. Looked real pretty, too. Naturally, I stopped the horses and stepped down to see if there was any little thing I could do for her. But she said no, she just wanted to talk.”

Paulie tried not to be judgmental, but the woman’s behavior already sounded fishy. “What did she want to talk about?”

“’Bout my route.”

Even Trip seemed surprised by this answer. “You mean your whiskey route?”

“Yeah,” Oat answered. “Mary Ann has quite a head for business. Right off she was askin’ how much territory I covered, and how many days I was on the road, and how much money did I make and all. Was real interested.”

His words sent a chill through Paulie. “Did you tell her how much money you made?”

“Why, sure,” Oat said. He looked a little abashed but admitted, “I guess I was flattered by her suddenly takin’ notice of an old coot like me. I know I ain’t much to look at, so I figured I needed to catch her fancy some other way.
So I started braggin’ a little, you know, tellin’ her about all the money I’d saved up and how I could stop sellin’ whiskey altogether if I had a mind to.”

Paulie blinked. “You could?” She started rethinking the commission she’d always paid him on that whiskey!

“Well, I ain’t rich, but I ain’t poor, neither. I got some put by.”

Paulie, Will, and Trip exchanged glances. She didn’t have to worry that only she was having doubts about the honesty of Mary Ann’s motives. It was written all over Will’s face, even, and he never seemed to want to hear the least bad thing said about her.

“Your savings…” She cleared her throat. “Do you still have them?”

Oat looked at her, surprised. “Why, sure.”

“So you counted your money after Mary Ann left?”

“Oh, I ain’t got the money in the house,” Oat assured them. “I got it all in government bonds back in a bank.”

“In Fort Stockton?” Paulie asked.

He shook his head. “In San Antone.”

Paulie didn’t want to think the worst of Mary Ann, she really didn’t. But it was so easy.

Oat looked from one face to the next, speculatively. “But it wasn’t for my money that she married me,” he said. “She lost all interest in the money the minute we were married and I told her my savings were in San Antone. Said she didn’t give a hoot about a bunch of old bonds, that cash was better.”

Better to steal so she could run off to find her lover, Paulie thought, feeling irate for Oat’s sake.

“Then why do you think she married you?” she asked, throwing tact to the wind to ask the question that had been perched on the tongue of every person within fifty miles of Possum Trot.

Oat’s simple nod indicated he didn’t mind her inquisitiveness. “Said she wanted someone to take her away from her troubles. Said she’d marry the first man who offered ‘to take her out of this place.’ That’s how she put it. I thought she meant she wanted away from the Breens. Didn’t know she wanted to go clear to San Antone.”

Paulie didn’t want to push Oat for any more answers. Mary Ann had obviously headed for the big city the moment she realized that marrying Oat wasn’t going to offer her any kind of financial rewards.

Oat looked tired, and what’s more, he was growing more agitated with every mention of San Antonio. “I guess I’ve got to defend her honor no matter why we married.”

Will cocked his head. “What do you mean, ‘defend her honor’?”

“Well…this Oren Tyler fellow. I guess I’ll have to take care of him,” Oat said.

Paulie bit her lip to keep herself from laughing at the idea of Oat getting into fisticuffs with the gambler. If memory served, Oren Tyler was the size of two Oats. He wasn’t anybody she would want to grapple with. But then, he hadn’t stolen her wife.

Only, according to Oat, Mary Ann hadn’t been much of a wife anyway.

“Durn, Oat. Maybe you should just talk to Mary Ann first, and see what she says.”

“She’ll probably just want to call the thing off, anyway,” he said, his shoulders sagging in defeat. “I guess it’s for the best.”

“You can’t be sure of that,” Trip assured him. “Maybe she’ll be glad to see you.”

Oat didn’t look convinced. In fact, he gave his shirt and britches a cold assessing stare and definitely found them
lacking. “I ain’t got much to recommend me,” he observed. “You say that Oren Tyler is a real dude?”

Paulie nodded regretfully. “But Trip’s right,” she said. “Maybe she’s already tired of the gambler. Women are funny, you know. Besides, you shouldn’t sell yourself short. I bet you clean up pretty neat.”

Will shot her a quelling glance, but she couldn’t help herself. It was as seductive to dream about Mary Ann rushing into Oat’s arms as it had been to dream of herself rushing into Will’s.

She smiled and gave Oat a friendly punch on his arm. She hated to see him looking so blue. In the past days she had developed a fondness for the old codger. He had a dry, sometimes almost imperceptible wit, but he could tell a good yarn, which was important when days on the road got long. And if it hadn’t been for him, they might all be still trussed up on the banks of the Rio Grande.

“Don’t worry, Oat. First thing when we get to San Antonio, we’ll run you by a barber and get you so fixed up that Mary Ann’ll wish she never left Possum Trot.”

Oat shrugged bashfully. “Don’t think that’s likely.”

“Well why not? She might be sittin’ in a hotel room up there, just waiting for you to show up. You’ll want to look your best.”

Her words seemed to latch on some stray wispy feather of optimism floating lost in Oat’s crotchety old soul. “Well, I guess maybe so. Maybe if 1 look like something, that Tyler fellow won’t want to duel.”

Paulie laughed. “I don’t think there’s been a duel in San Antonio for a few decades, Oat, so you can put that out of your mind.”

He smiled at her and actually caught her hand. “Just might take you up on the barber bit, Paulie,” he said. He
let go of her hand and rubbed his scraggly, furry chin. “Guess I could use a shave at that.”

Paulie felt a lump form in her throat. In all her years, she couldn’t remember Oat Murphy calling her by name. Now, as she looked into his light blue eyes, she could almost imagine her rosy scenario coming true. Oat wasn’t so bad. Once somebody shaved and washed him, and maybe treated him to a clean shirt, he might actually appeal to some women. Taking into account all that and those bonds of his, who was to say that he wouldn’t win Mary Ann back?