Badlanders (13 page)

“Don't try,” Edana said. “Just rest.”

“Daughter?” Alexander said again. He gazed at the ceiling and smiled. “Why, there's your mother. She's come to meet me.” A peaceful look came over him and he tried to raise his arm as if he were reaching for someone when suddenly he went limp, his eyes closed, and his head sagged to one side.

“Oh, Father,” Edana said, and lowering her face to the spread, she burst into loud sobs.

T
he buckboard got back early. It was still light, the sun not quite set, when it clattered and rattled over the last low rise and before them stretched the home ranch with its many buildings and corrals.

Jericho was riding beside them and almost immediately announced, “Somethin's wrong.”

“Eh?” Stumpy said, looking up.

Isolda was annoyed with him. He hadn't been as friendly on the way back as he had on the way out. Not that she cared whether he liked her or not. “I don't see anything the matter,” she said. It was as boringly picturesque as before.

“Where is everybody?” Stumpy said.

Only then did Isolda realize hardly any of the hands were out and about. There should be men working at various tasks, but the only sign of life was smoke rising from the cookhouse chimney and a single puncher lounging in front of the bunkhouse.

“I see Neal,” Jericho said.

Isolda was about to ask where when she spotted the foreman seated in a rocking chair on the front porch of
the ranch house. Although “seated” wasn't quite the right word. Slumped would have been better, as if he had collapsed into it.

“Somethin' has happened,” Stumpy said. “Somethin' awful bad.”

“You're just guessing,” Isolda said.

“No, ma'am,” Stumpy said. “I can feel it in my bones.”

Isolda was tempted to tell him what he could do with his old bones. But she sat up and held her bag in her lap and grew a little anxious as Stumpy brought the buckboard up to the house and held his hand out to help her climb down. She refused the offer and clambered from the seat on her own, her legs stiff from the long ride.

Jericho had dismounted and was approaching the steps. “Pard?” he said.

Neal Bonner rose from the rocking chair with the air of someone going to his own grave. He came to the steps and stared sorrowfully at Isolda. “I'm sorry for your loss, ma'am.”

Isolda was taken aback. “What loss?”

“You'd best go right in,” Neal said. “Your sister is upstairs in your pa's bedroom. She wanted to be alone with him.”

A terrible dread filled Isolda. She rushed up the steps and was inside and on the second floor before she regained control of her emotions. Moving to the doorway, she halted. Her father lay as one dead in his bed. Her sister had her face buried in the covers and an arm partly over him. “Edana?”

Edana jerked up and turned. Her eyes moistening, she startled Isolda by dashing over and throwing her arms around her. “Oh, sister. I wish you had been here. I've felt so alone.”

Isolda stared over her shoulder at the bed. She could feel her blood draining from her face, and a light-headedness came over her. “Is Father . . . ?”

“Dead? Yes,” Edana said, stepping back. Tears flowed, and she sniffled. “He insisted on riding a mustang and
was thrown. Our cook did all he could, but there was nothing anyone could have done.”

Isolda was too shocked to dwell on the absurdity of the cook playing at being a doctor. Going over, she sat on the bed and studied the pale face that for years had been both her comfort and her trial. She'd loved her father. She truly did. But he'd annoyed her no end with his insistence that she help in the family business. It had been his idea she take up bookkeeping. She'd have quit it long ago if something better had come along. “Oh, Father,” was all she said.

Edana joined her and clasped her hand. “I was with him at the end. He said he saw Mother.”

“Delirium,” Isolda said.

“You don't know that,” Edana said. “It could very well have been her in her spirit form.”

“Don't start with that again,” Isolda said. A long-running point of contention between them, one of many, was her refusal to believe in the fairy tale of life after death. Her sister did, though, and so had her father.

“I can't think of a better time,” Edana said. “Father has gone to his reward. We must give him a proper burial so his soul can rest in peace.”

“I agree about the funeral, but the rest is so much doggerel.”

Edana shook her head in reproach. “I will never understand how you can't have faith.”

“I'll never understand how you do.”

“There's the Bible, for one thing,” Edana said. “God and Jesus and . . .”

Isolda held up a hand. “Let's not quarrel. Not here. Not now. I'll go along with whatever you want, but don't impose the other on me.”

Edana looked at her strangely.

“What?”

“It just occurred to me,” Edana said, “you're not crying. I fell apart when he passed on, yet there you sit, as cool and collected as can be.”

“Why, so I am,” Isolda said. She was mildly shocked at her lack of emotion. But then, she always did keep a tight rein on her feelings, except for her flares of temper. She'd held everything in for so long that there were days when she'd thought she would burst. “I'll weep for him later. Right now we should see about having a coffin made and arrange for his body to be shipped back.”

“No,” Edana said. “We'll bury him here. It's fitting.”

“It's insane,” Isolda said. “This isn't our property. We're only running this ranch. We must take him back and bury him in the family plot at the cemetery, where he'd want to be buried.”

“In what state?”

“New York, of course.”

“I was referring to his physical state,” Edana said. “Decomposition will have set in long before we can get him there. He'll bloat and decay unless he's embalmed, and who is there to do the embalming? We're hundreds of miles from any funeral home.”

Isolda hadn't thought of that.

“It would take a week and a half by wagon, if not longer, to get him to one,” Edana continued, “and by then the smell would be horrendous. The rot would be so advanced that preserving his remains would be out of the question.”

“We can fill the coffin with salt.”

“From where? We don't have nearly enough.” Edana placed her hand on their father's chest. “I'd like to bury him next to Mother, too. But circumstances have conspired against us. And now that I know they're together again in the hereafter, it's not really necessary.”

Isolda bit off a sharp retort. “Let me think about it. There has to be a way.”

“For your sake I'll talk to Neal. Perhaps he knows of a method.” Edana had stopped crying but dabbed at an eye. “The other big question is what will become of us.”

“Us?” Isolda said.

“What do we do for a living now that Father is gone?
Move back East? I, for one, would rather not. The men who hired Father to run the Diamond B will need someone to replace him. I'm sending word to Franklyn Wells, and he'll probably get here as quickly as he can, but it will still take him weeks to arrive.”

Isolda hadn't thought of that, either. What would she like to do? she asked herself. She was no longer bound to her father, and his bookkeeping. She could do whatever she wanted, and she knew just what that was.

“This is the end of our life as we knew it,” Edana said sorrowfully.

“Yes, it is,” Isolda agreed, and inwardly she bubbled with excitement.

•   •   •

Beaumont Adams left Dyson and Stimms at the Three Aces. If he showed up with them at his back, it might give the impression he had a yellow streak. He kept his hands in his specially lined pockets, though, so he could resort to his pistols if he had to.

He wasn't stupid.

The man he was seeking had taken a shine to the Tumbleweed and could be found there most anytime after sunset. Beaumont figured it was because the Tumbleweed attracted the coarser element. A hard case like Scar Wratner fit right in.

The stars were out and a brisk breeze whirled dust in tiny eddies as Beaumont strode down Main Street.

It had been an interesting day, to say the least. Isolda Jessup's visit had started things off. He still couldn't get over how brazen she'd been. For a decent woman to go into a saloon was unthinkable. In some towns she would be ostracized by her more upstanding sisters.

Beaumont told himself that part of Isolda's audacity must stem from her being from back East. Eastern ladies must not be as snobbish as the Western variety. But then, most Western ladies came from back East, so that explanation didn't hold water.

No, Isolda Jessup was a rarity in that she apparently
didn't give a good damn what other women thought. She would do as she pleased and the rest of the world could go to hell.

Beaumont liked her outlook. He liked even more that she'd made a special trip to town to see him. She had made her interest plain. Now it was up to him to do something about it.

Beaumont must tread carefully. Isolda wasn't a saloon tart to be dallied with when he was in the mood and otherwise forgotten. She wasn't Darietta. She had wit, intelligence, beauty. With a woman like her at his side, a man could accomplish just about anything. Beaumont must cultivate her with care.

It had rankled him, having to let her walk out with that Texas-bred gun slick. Not that Beaumont had anything against Jericho. The man was only doing his job. But it had left the impression, in Beaumont's own mind, anyway, that he lacked grit. It didn't help that Floyd went and got his brains blown out, and he hadn't done anything about it.

Well, he was doing something now.

Beaumont strolled into the Tumbleweed as if he didn't have a care in the world. Smiling good-naturedly, he nodded at a few cardplayers he knew.

At the far end of the bar stood the gent he sought with an arm around a young dove. Wratner was nuzzling her neck and she was squealing and playfully pushing against him, but not too hard.

Grat and Tuck were at a nearby table. Both came to their feet when Beaumont strode up and he nodded at them, too.

“If you're hungry, Ma's is still open,” Beaumont said.

Scar Wratner raised his head and chuckled. “Well, look who it is, darlin'. Your new boss.”

The young dove regarded Beaumont with awe. “I saw you shoot Mr. Zimmerman and those others. It was something.”

“Go mingle with the other customers,” Beaumont said. “I have business to discuss with Mr. Wratner here.”

She giggled and nodded and scampered off, but not before Wratner gave her a loud smack on her fanny.

“I've been expectin' you, gambler-man.”

“Oh?” Beaumont caught the bartender's attention and pointed at a bottle. The barkeep promptly brought it and a glass and set them in front of him.

Scar Wratner slid his empty glass over. “Fill mine while you're at it.” Leering after the dove, he nodded and said, “I heard about your visitor. Hell, the whole town has heard by now.”

“So?”

“So everyone is sayin' as how Jericho waltzed into your place and took that Eastern gal right out from under your nose.”

“That wasn't how it was,” Beaumont said in irritation as he poured.

Scar Wratner shrugged. “The important thing is that it showed you I was right. You need me. That's why you're here. To take me up on my offer.”

“You're awful sure of yourself.”

“Show me anyone else in this two-bit town who can hold a candle to me besides you and Jericho.”

“Thanks for includin' me at the top,” Beaumont said dryly.

“I've seen you at work,” Scar said. “With me to back you, inside of a month this town will be yours.”

“It will be mine anyway,” Beaumont declared.

“Then why are you here if not to hire me?”

Beaumont mustn't appear too eager. He stalled by raising his glass and taking a couple of slow swallows. “You have me pegged,” he admitted. “I've given it a lot of thought and I'd like you on my payroll.” He took another swallow. “But not at a fifth of all my earnin's.”

“How much, then?”

Beaumont leaned on the bar. “In return for your six-
shooters bein' at my beck and call, you can run the Tumbleweed for me and keep half of the profits. That's more than fair, if you ask me.”

Scar looked at the drinkers lining the bar and the cardplayers, and frowned. “What the hell do I know about runnin' a saloon?”

“That will be the easy part,” Beaumont said. “A man of mine by the name of Deitch will do the actual busywork, keepin' the books and orderin' the liquor and such. All you have to do is show up and drink and fondle the gals to your heart's content.”

“I don't know,” Scar said uncertainly, although it was obvious the idea appealed to him.

“You'd be the cock of the walk,” Beaumont said, laying it on. “Deitch will answer to you as he will to me. Anything you want, within reason, you can do.”

“My own saloon. That would beat all.”

“Don't forget fifty percent of the proceeds. We're talkin' hundreds a night if you don't take to killin' folks and scarin' everybody off.”

“My own saloon,” Scar said again.

“Under me,” Beaumont amended, and thrust out his hand. “Do we have a deal or not?”

Scar Wratner laughed and thrust out his. “We do. Let me know when you want someone's wick snuffed, and he's as good as gone.”

E
dana Jessup didn't think things could get any worse.

The father she had loved and adored and looked up to had died under horrible circumstances, casting her and her sister adrift on the turbulent sea of life. They had no jobs of their own and would no doubt be asked to pack up and leave. The consortium would hire a new manager, and that would be that.

She spent a sleepless night tossing and turning and was up before the rooster crowed. Dressing, she made her way to the kitchen and put coffee on the stove. It was still dark out and she wasn't expecting company, which was why she jumped when someone knocked lightly on the back door. Going over, she parted the small curtain and peeked out. “Neal!” she exclaimed in delight, and wasted no time in throwing the bolt and working the latch.

The foreman had his hat in hand and wore a sheepish expression. “Sorry to bother you so early, ma'am, but I saw the light and figured one of you must be up and about.”

“Come in, come in,” Edana said eagerly, pulling on
his arm. “You have no idea how auspicious your timing is.”

“Shucks,” Neal said. “I don't reckon I know what auspicious even is.”

Edana ushered him to a chair and bid him sit. “Coffee will be ready in a while. In the meantime, how about if I prepare eggs and bacon? How hungry are you?”

“Not hungry at all,” Neal admitted. “I've been too worried to pay much mind to food.”

“Worried about the ranch and the transition, no doubt,” Edana said, sitting across from him.

“No, ma'am,” Neal said. “Worried about you.”

“Oh.”

“About what will happen now that your pa is gone. Will you and your sister light a shuck?”

“We'll probably be asked to,” Edana said. “But I'd rather not go if it can be avoided.” She bent toward him. “I have a plan. Whether it succeeds depends on your help. If it does, I might be able to stay. If not . . .” She didn't finish.

“I'd do anything in the world for you,” Neal said.

Edana swore her ears were burning. “The only way I will get to stay is if I can convince the men who hired my father that I can do the job every bit as competently as he could.”

“What would you need from me?”

“An education in ranching,” Edana said. “You've already shared a lot, but now I need to know everything that has a bearing on making the Diamond B a success. And by everything, I mean every detail, no matter how piddling.”

“I can do that,” Neal assured her.

“We'll have to be together from daybreak until sunset for days on end.” Edana grinned self-consciously. “Can you stand that much of my company?”

“That and more, I reckon.”

“I apologize for imposing myself on you in this fashion, but I don't know how much time I have,” Edana said.
“I sent a rider to town last night with a letter for Franklyn Wells, but there's no telling how long it will take to reach him and for him to reach us.”

“I hope it's a month or more.”

“You do?”

“To have more time to teach you,” Neal said quickly.

“Of course.” Edana placed her hand on his. “I want to thank you for standing by me. I've said it before and I'll say it again. You're the only real friend I have here.”

“Does that include me?” intruded a voice from the doorway.

Edana turned. Her sister was bundled in a bulky robe and her hair was disheveled. She had obviously just woken up and not bothered to put herself together. “Go get dressed. We have company.”

“Is that what you call him?” Isolda stepped to the stove and held her hand close to the coffeepot. “I'll go after I say what I came down here to say.” She smiled at Neal Bonner. “Forgive my appearance. She didn't tell me we had a visitor at this ungodly hour.”

“Isolda,” Edana said.

“But that's always been the way with her, and Father as well.” Isolda moved to the end of the table. “I've never been deemed important enough to be let in on a lot of their decisions.”

“That's not true,” Edana said, sitting up. “Father never did anything without consulting both of us.”

“You, he consulted,” Isolda said. “Me, he told me what to do based on what the two of you had decided.”

“You shouldn't speak ill of the dead,” Edana said angrily.

About to yawn, Isolda rolled her eyes. “Who's speaking ill? I'm saying exactly how it was. For years I put up with it. For years I was the dutiful daughter always doing as her father wanted. Well, now he's gone, and I can finally have a life of my own.”

“I can't believe I'm hearing this.” Edana never suspected her sister felt this way. She'd always assumed Isolda was perfectly happy in the work she did.

“You wouldn't have to hear it if you'd stopped and looked around you now and then. Father and you were too caught up in your own lives to pay any attention to me.”

“I resent that.”

Isolda snorted. “Resent it all you want. It's the truth. I've had it up to here”—and she touched a finger to her chin—“with ledgers and accounts. I want something new. Something different.”

“What is this leading up to?” Edana wanted to know.

“Simply this,” Isolda said. “I'm leaving the Diamond B. You're welcome to stay on and run it by yourself, but count me out.”

Shock cleaved Edana's tongue to her mouth.

“From what I overheard, you'll have all the help you need,” Isolda went on with a smirk at Neal Bonner. “You won't really need me for anything.”

“But where will you go? What will you do?”

“Whiskey Flats.”

“Why on earth there? I should think New York City or Philadelphia is more to your liking.”

“You'd be surprised,” Isolda said. “At any rate, I'm leaving about noon and I honestly can't say when you'll see me again.” She ran a hand through her hair.

“Can't we talk this out?” Edana requested. “It's all so sudden.”

“Not for me.”

“Father dying yesterday, and now this.” Edana shook her head. “My whole world is falling apart.”

“I'll only be a few hours away, and I'll come if you need me,” Isolda said. “That's better than my returning to New York, isn't it?”

“I suppose,” Edana said, “but I still don't like it. I was counting on you to be by my side.”

“You'll be too busy with your cowboy to even notice I'm gone.”

“Don't be crude,” Edana said.

Isolda leaned on the table. “It's time you grew up, sis. You're not getting any younger, and unless you want to
spend the rest of your life as a spinster, you should look around and smell the roses, as they say.” Turning, she moved toward the hall. “As for me, I have a whole new life and a whole new world to explore, and frankly, I can't wait.” She paused in the doorway. “Don't take any of this personally. It's been building in me for a long time. I would have done this sooner or later. Later, I admit, were Father still alive. As sorry as I am that he's gone, and I truly am, I'm happy I won't have to deal with him trying to stop me.”

“Oh, Isolda.”

“Oh, yourself. I'm not a saint and never claimed to be. I've been a dutiful daughter. You have to grant me that much. Now that part of my life is over. I'm going out into the world my own woman.” Pulling her robe tighter, Isolda departed.

“Well,” Edana said.

“She speaks her mind,” Neal remarked.

“She's always had an independent streak. But I didn't expect it to rear its head so soon after Father's passing.” Edana bowed her head. It saddened her, her sister's decision. At the same time, she felt a certain sense of relief. It was all on her now. All on her shoulders. She could do as she pleased without any interference from anyone.

God willing, she could do her father proud by making the Diamond B one of the best ranches in the territory, or anywhere else for that matter.

“Every hand here will back you, ma'am,” Neal said. “You can count on it.”

“Eh?” Edana looked up. She realized she'd said that last out loud. “Will they really? They won't mind working for a woman?”

“You forget where you are,” Neal said.

“I don't follow you.”

Neal sat back and gestured at the window. “West of the Mississippi, menfolk hold women in high regard. For all the fancy talk those Easterners do, it's us Westerners who give women their due.”

“I wish I had your confidence,” Edana confessed.

“If you'd lived your whole life out here like I have, you would. Out here a man sees how hard his woman works, all the cookin' and sewin' and laundry and whatnot she does, and he sees her more as his partner than his property. It's why cowboys were the first anywhere to give women the right to vote.”

Edana's interest perked. “I remember hearing about that.”

“Wyoming, it was,” Neal said, “ten to fifteen years ago. Not that state where you're from, where they do a lot of talkin' about women's rights and such but never give their women the same rights the men have.”

“All too true,” Edana said.

“It took a bunch of ranchers and cowboys to say that their partners deserved the same as them, and now the women in Wyoming go to the polls the same as the men and can hold office if they're of a mind.” Neal paused and grinned. “Or run a ranch the same as any man.”

Edana was encouraged by his confidence. She'd worried that perhaps the punchers would refuse to work for her based on her gender. “Granting that all you've said is true, I have to prove worthy of their trust.”

“That's where I come in.”

Edana grew warm inside. He was so eager to help, so anxious to please. Her heart was stirred, and she took his hand. “I'll be forever in your debt. You don't realize how much this means to me.”

“I reckon I do, ma'am. It means a lot to me, too.”

They looked into each other's eyes, and for a moment Edana felt as if time were standing still. She tingled from her hand to her shoulder, and if he had leaned over to kiss her, she would have thrown herself into his arms.

Then loud pounding intruded, and the moment was gone.

“Someone is knockin' on your front door,” Neal said.

“Who can it be this early?” Edana rose and hurried
out and was pleased he came with her. It seemed natural having him at her side. She let him open the door.

It was Billy and Yeager, the former with his arm raised to knock again. “Neal!” he exclaimed. “We've been lookin' for you.”

“You found me,” Neal said. “What's so important that you have to bother Miss Jessup in her grief?”

“I'm right sorry, ma'am,” Billy said to Edana. “I guess I wasn't thinkin'.”

“Say why you're here,” Edana said.

“Oh. Barlow just got in from the range. They found another steer like that first. It'd been shot and some of the meat taken and the rest left to rot.”

“We have some of the boys ready to ride,” Yeager said.

“Tell them I'll be there in a bit,” Neal said. “Those as have rifles are to bring them, and grub for two days or more.”

The pair jangled off.

“Must you go?” Edana said.

“Someone is goin' around killin' our cattle. Two dead steers might not sound like much when the Diamond B has thousands of head, but it's the insult of the thing.”

“No, I mean must you go
now
?” Edana said. “I have to bury my father, and I'd very much like for you to be there. Can't this wait?”

Neal looked at her. “For you, I'll stay. I'll send the others out, though, for a look-see. Maybe they can find some tracks this time.” He touched his hat brim. “Ma'am,” he said, and went out.

Smiling, Edana closed the door. She liked how readily he'd changed his plans at her request. It brought to mind his talk about how men and women should work as partners. She liked that a lot, too.

Neal Bonner wasn't like any man she'd ever known. She'd only been around him for a few days, yet he stirred her as no man ever had. She wasn't stupid. She
recognized the signs in herself. The question now was what to do about it. A romance was the last thing she needed, on top of everything else.

Edana started down the hall, and abruptly stopped. She had a sense of being watched. Glancing at the stairs, she said, “How long have you been there?”

Isolda, still in her robe, was leaning on the banister. “I heard the knocking, the same as you.”

“What's that smirk for?”

“You, dear sister,” Isolda said. “Invite me to the wedding or I'll be terribly disappointed.”

“You think you know, but you don't.”

“Deny it all you want,” Isolda said, “but I do know one thing. We haven't been here a week and our lives have been forever changed.”