Texas Angel, 2-in-1 (63 page)

“I heard about what happened,” she said softly, lowering her voice even more when she saw the baby was asleep.

“Poor fella,” Micah said. “It’s a rotten thing to happen to an innocent kid.”

“Yes. To lose his mother like that . . . it makes me sick.” She gingerly lifted the corner of the blanket, Micah’s trail blanket he’d torn in half to use for the child. “But he seems awfully content now.”

She lifted her eyes from the baby, focusing fully on Micah. He felt like squirming under her gaze but willed himself to keep still. So as not to disturb the boy, he told himself. He didn’t know why his heart seemed to stop moving as well.

“Th-the constable says he’s got other family up north, so that’s good.” Micah’s voice squeaked nervously over the words.

“Mrs. Wendell at church said she’d take the boy until his family can be found.”

“Well, where is she?”

“Are you going to be able to let him go?” She smiled, her eyes twinkling, but not in a taunting way. “Tom explained how you’ve cared for the baby since he was found. He said you had a special knack—”

“That fool Tom!” Micah exclaimed, his raised voice causing little Haden to move and whimper in his arms.

“What’s wrong with that?”

“I just did what had to be done.”

“Like when you rescued me?” Her smile broadened and now contained a trace of smugness.

“Oh, that’s—” But Micah was cut off as the door opened.

Mr. and Mrs. Wendell, accompanied by the constable and his deputy, entered. Micah was never so relieved and so unhappy about seeing anyone. Micah told himself the child needed a woman’s care. As for himself, he had Indians to hunt and Mexicans to kill. He had a job to do that held no room in it for babies and such.

Yet when it came time to relinquish the boy, Micah found it difficult to release him. But he wasn’t about to let it show. With a grunt and loud sigh of relief, he deposited Haden into the woman’s outstretched arms.

“Thank goodness you finally got here,” he said. “This kid was about to drive me crazy.”

Micah hurried from the office the first chance he could, choosing a moment when Lucie was occupied in conversation with Mrs. Wendell. He raced outside, gasping in air as soon as he’d exited. His throat felt constricted, and his eyes were burning.

He gulped deep breaths. How could he have let that kid get to him so?

Then Lucie was there at his side. She’d gotten to him, too! And it scared him.

But he couldn’t resist looking at her. Now that his arms felt so achingly empty from the departure of the child, he thought it would be so easy to fill them with Lucie’s soft, inviting form.

“I must see to my father,” she said, her words not quite breaking the spell but at least keeping him from doing something very foolish.

“Give him my regards.”

“I will.” She gave him a parting smile, turned, then paused and turned back. “Mr. Sinclair, I was wondering if you knew about the ball to be held here in town next weekend? You might enjoy it, and if you attended, I would love to save a dance for you.”

“Well, I . . .” He stared at her, incredulous. He had never been to a dance in his life, and he certainly had never been promised a dance with a beautiful, genteel lady such as she. It smacked of civilization, and coming as it did on the heels of the unsettling experience with the baby, it frightened the life out of him. But in an odd way, it enticed him, too. He knew he should tell her “no thanks.”

Babies and dances and genteel ladies were not for men like him.

“I’ll see if I can make it,” he heard himself say.

CHAPTER

13

M
ICAH DECIDED NOT TO GO
to the dance. He didn’t know why. It just seemed like a good idea to avoid such vestiges of civilization. He had gone out on another patrol with several rangers, and he had hoped that would have kept him away, but as ill-luck would have it, they returned to town Saturday morning.

“Plenty of time to get yourself spruced up for that dance,” Tom suggested as they tended their horses.

“And how am I supposed to do that, Tom?” Micah groused. He was tired and ill tempered. The patrol had not gone well. He had been sent off to investigate some tracks leading to a ravine and had gotten turned around and lost his way back to the main force. When he finally did catch up to the company, the men had ridiculed him unmercifully, all in good nature, of course, for days after.

“A bath would be in order first,” Tom replied, wrinkling his nose.

“You smell like a coyote yourself, Tom, so don’t go making fun of me!”

But Micah did smell, and his beard was stubbly and itchy, and his hair was plastered down against his scalp with sweat and grime. However, these drawbacks could be easily repaired. What he could do nothing about was his clothing. He had no change of clothes, and there was no way he’d take more charity. Even if he was of a mind to go to the dance, he could not do so in dusty, worn dungarees and a matching shirt. The worst of it was, if he attempted to launder these items one more time, they would probably fall apart.

“Anyway, how’d you know about that dance?” Micah asked.

“Jed mentioned it.”

Micah glared at Jed, whose lips were curved into a smirk. “I ain’t never seen no one with a bigger mouth!” Micah rebuked his friend.

“He also told me as how that pretty little Maccallum gal wanted to dance with you,” Tom added.

“So what?”

“You’re at an age where you ought to be thinking of settling down.” This seemed a peculiar statement coming from the grizzled bachelor.

“What are you? My mother?” Micah sneered.

Tom grunted a couple of unkind remarks, then returned his attention to his horse, loosening the bindings and removing the saddle.

They were in the field near the edge of town where the rangers had staked out their camp while off duty. One of the men had built a fire and was cooking a late breakfast. Others were grooming their mounts after the stint on the trail and others were heading to the river for baths in what little water there was so late in summer.

“If I had a gal like that who wanted me,” Jed declared, “I sure wouldn’t refuse.”

“Then take her,” Micah muttered.

Jed only snickered and snorted in response. “But, Micah, you got things turned around, don’t ya? First you got the baby, then you got the gal, and you ain’t even got married yet.” He laughed even harder at his humor.

Cursing at his friend, Micah turned to tending his buckskin. Even if he had botched this most recent mission, Jose had performed admirably. As Micah unhitched the saddle, his thoughts turned to the woman who had given him the horse, though he truly wanted
not
to think of her. He wondered what it would be like to dance with her, to take her dainty little hand in his, to see her smile and glow with the exertion of the rousing music. He’d heard of a dance called a waltz where couples actually held each other. It wouldn’t be as close as he’d held her when she had fainted, but close enough, he supposed.

What was he thinking? He couldn’t even dance, for heaven’s sake! He would trip over his own feet and hers as well. Was civilized dancing the same as he’d done in cantinas and bawdy houses? He’d learned a few things about dancing from those gals. But it couldn’t be the same, could it?

“Hey, Tom,” Micah said, “you think they dance the same at a respectable ball as they do in a saloon?”

“Ain’t as much holding on to the gals as you might do in a saloon,” Tom answered thoughtfully.

“So you’ve been to a ball like the one tonight?”

“Once or twice,” Tom replied rather shortly, then turned his back to Micah.

Micah had the feeling Tom was holding back. Not that he was the most ebullient of men, but it seemed as if he was leaving something very important unsaid. Micah also sensed from Tom’s suddenly solemn demeanor that it was best not to probe further.

Jed, not as sensitive to subtle changes in temperament, started laughing once again. “You, Tom?” He snorted. “Show us, Tom! Show us how they dance respectable like.”

“Micah’s right!” Tom growled, “you got a mouth bigger than the Palo Duro Canyon. Now shut it up!”

Still laughing, Jed urged, “Come on, Tom, you’re supposed to be our teacher. Teach Micah to dance!”

In a mere blink of Jed’s eyes, Tom snatched his Bowie knife from its scabbard and held it threateningly before Jed’s face, which had paled a shade or two in response to the sudden action.

“Shut up, or I’ll ram this down your throat!” Tom growled.

Jed backed up a step. It was clear the usually mild-mannered ranger had a dangerous side that Jed had seriously stirred.

“All right, all right,” Jed muttered, “I was just funning. Can’t no one have no fun!” He stalked away with his head jutted forward, still muttering as he went.

Tom sheathed his knife, tied his horse, then said, “I’m going to the river.”

Securing Jose, Micah followed Tom. He still saw no way he could attend the dance, but he needed a bath nonetheless. On the way they met a couple dripping rangers.

“Reckon you got the water all muddy for the rest of us,” Tom grumbled.

“What’s got into you?” asked one of the men.

“None of your business!”

The rangers just rolled their eyes and continued on. Micah caught up to Tom. He knew it was risky, but he asked, “What’d Jed do to set you off, Tom?”

“Nothing.”

They reached the water’s edge and stripped down to their long johns. There were already two or three men splashing around in the water. Micah and Tom joined them. The water was muddy but cool in the summer heat. One of the other swimmers offered the use of a hunk of lye soap. Micah lathered up his hair, and as he ducked under the water to rinse he thought he would smell like lye, but at least he’d be clean. But why did it matter? He wasn’t going anywhere.

A few minutes later he sloshed out of the water and onto the shore to dry in the sun before donning his clothes. Tom came up the bank a couple minutes later.

“Can’t go to no dance in these,” Micah said, picking up his shirt with two fingers and giving it a shake, sending a cloud of dust all around.

“Yeah, they do look pretty sorry,” Tom offered.

“Maybe they can stand one more wash.”

“Won’t help.” Tom gave his shaggy wet hair a shake, sending a spray of water to join the dust. “I’m sorry ’bout what I said to Jed,” he added.

“Don’t tell me. Tell him.”

“I’m also sorry for needling you about going to that dance.” Tom sat down on a rock, stretching his legs out before him. “I nearly forgot something that happened to me a long time ago. When it come to my mind, Jed’s words were just like rubbing a raw nerve.”

“What happened?”

“I been to only one dance, so I ain’t that much of an expert. It was just before I come to Texas.” He scraped a hand over his chin. “Actually, it was kind of your fault I went. I was pretty content hunting and trapping and living on my own, but when I seen your family and especially you and your little sister when I guided y’all to Natches . . . well, it just put a hankering in me to have a family of my own. I was only thirty years old, so I figured I wasn’t over the hill yet.”

Micah gaped openmouthed at his friend. “You was only thirty years old! I remember thinking you was an old man.”

Tom snorted a laugh. “Thirty looks a lot older when you are twelve than when you are twenty-one, I suppose. Anyway, I figured to find myself a wife. I didn’t fancy a squaw or a hurdy-gurdy woman, so when I heard about a respectable dance in town, I gussied myself up and went down from the hills to attend. There was a gal there who gave me a sweet smile, and I thought for sure she might take a shine to me.” Pausing, his eyes glassed over momentarily, as if it were no longer Micah’s grubby face before him but rather that of a pretty freckle-faced, blue-eyed dream. “I asked her to dance, and we did okay while the music was slow and easy. I didn’t know the steps but could keep up, just tramping on her toes once or twice. Then the band struck up a fast reel. I got overconfident, forgetting I was just a clumsy mountain man. Somehow my feet got tangled up, and I went flying to the ground. Out of pure reflex I grabbed on to her, and we both went stumbling and tripping. I tore her dress in a most immodest way. She screamed and cried and started hitting me. Then her pa got in the act and began beating me up. I barely got out of there with my life. Swore I’d never go to another dance again.”

The two men fell silent. The hot sun felt good baking on Micah’s face and wet body. His underwear was drying out quickly. His hair was also dry, and to keep the glare of the sun from his eyes, he grabbed his hat from his pile of clothes and pressed it on his head. In the moody quiet that hovered over him and Tom, Micah considered the older man’s sad story. His friend’s experience seemed as good a reason as any to keep away from places where one did not belong, and Micah instinctively knew he would be as out of place at the dance tonight as Tom had been at his. Micah had lived wild for too many years to consider mixing with decent folks now.

“I’m glad you told me that story,” he said at length. “You probably kept me from making a first class fool of myself.”

“That’s not why I told you about my experience,” Tom said. “I just thought you ought to know why I was acting the way I was. Just ’cause I made an ignoramus of myself don’t mean you’d do the same.”

“I don’t get it. You still saying I should go to that dance?”

“I ain’t saying nothing, you dunderhead!” Tom snapped. “Make up your own mind.”

“Well, maybe I would go if I had decent clothes.”

Tom jumped up and strode to the pile of clothes. He picked up an item between two fingers as if it were diseased. “It’ll take another wash.

And you won’t look half bad once it’s clean.”

“I don’t want no wife,” Micah suddenly declared.

Tom stared at him, then laughed. “First things first, boy.” He dropped the garment back into the dusty heap. “Who knows? Maybe she don’t want no husband.”

“Isn’t that what all respectable women want?”

Tom shrugged. “Going to a dance isn’t a marriage proposal. But I’m thinking a man ought to go to at least one dance in his life. I figure it has more in the way of making a man out of you than killing Comanches.”