The Milch Bride (12 page)

The sheriff’s face changed from smiling campaigner to man in
charge.

“Come on, let’s get these animals tallied and moved home,”
he barked.

As Jackson hazed forty animals home, most with Stoddard
brands he was relieved not to have to ride guard tonight. He’d probably move
his cot out to the porch. He’d left Tony behind since he and his horse were
spent, but also because he didn’t want to leave Hattie and the baby unguarded.

James Boyd was back from town. Maybe the chuck wagon cook
could be persuaded to move into the house and take over Rubye’s job. If he did,
that might be the best solution. Then Jackson wouldn’t have to fight off the
hounds and mosquitoes to sleep on the porch.

As they approached the ranch, Jackson sent his men to move
the animals into the large front paddock with the other recovered animals. “Cut
out the horses, see if you can get them stabled and grained”

Tony came out into the yard to greet them. “See you found
our cows, boss. What about the rustlers?”

“Not yet, but Cliff and Hank are still on their trail.”
Jackson looked up at the darkening sky, “Although I expect they’ll have to give
it up soon. James inside?”

“Yeah, he’s been back a couple of hours. He’s inside,
helping Miss Stoddard rustle up some grub.”

Jackson slid from the saddle, patted his horse’s neck. He
knew the animal was as relieved as he was to be home and done for the night. He
loosened the cinch and swung the saddle over the rail, pulled off the bridle
and turned the big bay into the barn. The animal swished into his stall and
snorted, already demanding his food and rub down.

Tony smiled at Jackson. “I’ll take care of Red for you, boss.
Reckon they’ve been holding supper awhile.”

Jackson nodded. He stopped at the well, drew a pail of water
and washed up first. Then, untying his gun, he uncinched the gun belt and
carried the belt with its dangling guns and his long rifle toward the house.

He was surprised to see James Boyd in an apron, waiting on
the porch. So much for a peaceful home-coming.

“James, I’m glad to see you. Appreciate your helping Hattie
get supper.”

“Yeah, I need to talk, boss.”

Jackson sank wearily into the rocker, motioned James to the
porch rail. When the older man was settled, he asked, “You got Miss Rubye
settled in town.”

“Oh, yeah, them Dawsons welcomed her in like company. She
was pretty hot still boss, had a lot to say.”

“Yeah, I figured she would.”

The older cowboy looked bashfully beyond the screen into the
house. “She’s old-fashioned, you know, boss, and was awful fond of Miz Donna.”

“I know, James, we all loved Donna.”

“She had heard a lot of gossip, boss, we all had, about
Tom’s daughter. Reckon we all had made up our minds about her not being the
right kind of woman for our baby.”

Jackson felt his face flush with anger, then took a breath
and forced himself to stay calm. “I had my own reservations.”

Boyd shifted uncomfortably. “I tried to talk Rubye into
coming back and apologizing, but she…”

Jackson nodded, “I know, she can be mulish.”

James laughed softly, “Mulish is right.”

“What do you think, James, about Miss Hattie?”

James stared at the porch floor and looked uncomfortable. “She’s
not what the gossips said.”

“No,” Jackson sighed, “no she’s not. She’ll need our help
now, to do all the work.”

“I was thinking, I could move in, maybe put a cot in the
living room, and do most of the cooking.”

Jackson extended a hand and rose taking the older man’s arm.
Feeling happy he patted him on the shoulder. “Thank you, pardner. Why don’t you
just take my cot in the study. I’ll sleep in Rubye’s room. It’s been too long
since I’ve slept in a real bed.”

James nodded. “Good, it puts you a little farther from the
missy.”

“There’s nothing going on between me and Miss Stoddard,” he
bristled.

“That’s too bad boss, I was wishing there was,” he added and
left a shocked Jackson on the porch.

Jackson wanted to talk with Hattie, but she was in her room.
James set food out and let the men help themselves to rewarmed sliced roast and
vegetables, sliced and stewed tomatoes, and fresh buttered cornbread. He knew
she was listening, but the men were too tired and hungry and stayed unusually
quiet.

<><><> 

It was morning, when she rose to fire the stove and put on
coffee and porridge before she got her first inkling of how things would go. She
held the egg basket in one hand, the six eggs inside in her apron.

“I forgot to gather the eggs yesterday, or feed the hens.”
James added sheepishly. “They may go on strike and quit laying if I forget them
again.”

“They do a pretty good job of finding plenty to eat. The
only danger of not gathering the eggs is that the older hens will go broody and
see it as their job to start nesting.”

“Maybe the boss will let me and a couple of the boys get a
coop built. They all sure like eggs for breakfast.”

Jackson came out of Rubye’s room, “I’ll have the new hands
help do it today. Now, how about a couple of those eggs for our breakfast?” 
Hattie started to cook them, when he added, “James.”

James smiled, “Okay, boss. But it’s going to be hoecakes for
the rest of them. Let me get some bacon going first.” He took the basket of
eggs from Hattie, set it down next to the stove and headed down to the cellar
for a slab of bacon.

Jackson motioned for her to sit down, and then carried out
coffee for them both.

“I should help James while J.D. is still asleep,” but even
as she said it, they both heard a half-hearted cry. Together they walked to the
door and watched the baby, rear in the air, stretching and getting ready to
fuss. Hattie picked up a clean diaper before reaching him. She removed the wet
gown as the baby stood upright, holding shakily to his daddy. She pulled the
wet gown over his head while Jackson passed her a dry smock and she expertly
changed and dressed the standing baby.

She walked into the kitchen, and dipped half a ladle of hot
oatmeal into the bottom of the bowl. When James emerged up the stairs again he
carried a jug of cold milk. He poured a dollop over her hot porridge. She sat
down at her place, blowing to cool the cereal in the spoon before offering it
to J.D. Jackson sat down, watching as the baby leaned forward, his mouth pursed
in imitation of Hattie’s. When the boy opened his mouth like a little bird, Jackson
began to talk while she was feeding him.

“As you heard yesterday, I shot two of the rustlers. We
trailed them back to your ranch, but they’d cleared out ahead of us.”

“They were living in our house? How?”

“Somehow they had four cots in the bedrooms, a new table and
chairs out front.”

“Dad and my beds?”

“Not sure what they did with them. Just know they had four
beds, four chairs, and a table that didn’t have broken legs.”

“So you believe there are four rustlers? I always felt it
would be the Sweat brothers and Rafe Hogue.”

“I’ve figured the same. But we didn’t catch them. There
could be more than four. Cliff and Hank came back when it grew too dark to read
sign. They said the wagon tracks turned onto the main road and were lost by
other tracks, mainly by those from the sheriff’s horse and other men coming
from town. I still don’t see how he would have missed seeing them on that
road.”

“You think he or one of his deputies could be the fourth
man?”

“It just seems suspicious to me. I planned to talk to the
other ranchers, but the sheriff stayed until we’d made a tally of the animals
and sent them home with their owners. Didn’t get a chance to talk it out, but
you could tell everybody thought something was odd there.”

She wiped J.D.’s face, kissed his cheek, leaning him back in
her arms to smile at his sweet face. He reached out a hand to touch her breast
and her hand paused at the top buttons. Before, it had become routine to feed
him his porridge, then let him nurse a while before getting up to help Rubye feed
the men. Now with two men present, that wouldn’t be possible.

She heard bacon sizzling in the kitchen, heard James singing
a soft song as he stirred up pancake batter. Jackson smiled at her as the baby
butted against her chest and started to complain. Hattie blushed.

“I’ll get the blanket.”

Grateful, she began to unbutton her blouse and as soon as
Jackson dropped the blanket over her shoulder, J.D. began to nurse.

He refilled his coffee cup and sat down. Hattie started to
thank him when J.D. suddenly tugged the blanket down. Gasping, she grabbed a
corner and hid herself, but this time he pushed it away with his fist.
Embarrassed, Hattie lifted baby and blanket and fled the room.

Jackson laughed at her red face and James came out of the
kitchen with two plates. “What did you say to run her off?”

“Not me. Something J.D. did.”

“Well, no sense letting eggs go to waste.” He sat down
across from Jackson and started to eat.

“I thought you were the new cook.”

“Might be the cook, but I ain’t new. Ladies ate before the
hands filled up the place. Seems like a good notion to me. If a cook eats last,
he either goes hungry, or has to eat a lot of really bad cooking.”

<><><> 

Hattie put a happy J. D. in the porch cradle and set it to
rocking. She carried both wash tubs to the yard beside the well. To one she
added a washboard and a cake of onyx soap before filling it with water. Next
she carried out and added the dirty clothes, turning the empty basket upside
down and once again rocking the cradle. Quickly, she washed out and scrubbed
the clothes. She called to James to watch the baby for a few minutes before
hanging them.

The sun was almost up and the house empty. She stepped into
the barn, scooped up grain then walked outside calling to wake the sleepy
chickens. She heard three or four half attempts at crows, but her favorite, the
little red rooster, leaped to a rail and gave a full throated cock-a-doodle-do.
She could already see darkening colors among his short tail feathers, definitely
her little rooster.

Quickly, she sprinkled a handful of grain below the rail and
cooed. “Come on down, cock robin, eat the pretty grain.” He cocked his head,
eyed her suspiciously, and then stretched for a second crow. Satisfied that he
wasn’t headed for the skillet, he hopped down to gobble his special share of
grain.

Hattie laughed, feeling free and happy. In the barn, it took
several minutes to find all the nests and gather the eggs, most with two eggs
in them. She even had one of the older hens who was trying to set. Hattie
looked at her but left no feed. The foolish hen might set another day, but
hunger would draw her off. Even foolish hens recognized cold eggs were never
going to hatch, of course, neither were infertile eggs.

She stopped in surprise when one of the horses nickered at
her from the back stall. She slipped back and set her full basket down to grab
the nose poked over the stall rails. “Oh Rose,” she climbed on the stall gate
and hugged the tall neck of her roan mare. It had been a year since those men
had taken her and her father’s saddle horse. She looked over and saw the wide
white blaze of her dad’s gelding. “Hey, Buddy,” she patted the nose tentatively
leaning closer.

“They were part of the rustled animals we recovered last
night. You want to see the rest?”

She wiped her eyes and turned toward the deep voice behind
her. It didn’t help. She let go of the rail and turned into his arms.

For a moment he held her, while she fought for self-control.
Then despite his better judgment, he leaned closer, catching the scent of the
horse she’d just hugged, the chickens she’d just fed, the scent of laundry
soap, even the sweet scents of milk and baby. But underneath it all was the
warm musky smell of woman. His body reacted instantly.

Alarmed, he pushed her away.

“They’re still in the front paddock,” he growled. He almost
made the mistake of grabbing her hand, but instead, he touched her elbow to
guide her in the right direction.

Hattie gasped, totally confused. She couldn’t believe she’d
turned into his arms so easily. Recalling herself, she stopped and turned to
walk back for the egg basket. As they passed, she set the basket on the porch,
watching as James sat peeling potatoes while J.D. clutched and chewed on his
pony.

She gave the old cowhand a watery smile. “Did you know about
the horses?”

He gave her a grin, “Wait till you see the front paddock.”

The scene there made her worry that she might tear up again.
A big angry bull stood, snorting, amid a herd of fifty plus cows and calves. She
turned in wonder and delight toward Jackson. “Those aren’t all mine?”

“No,” he laughed, “there are thirty that are ours. But
almost all of yours are pregnant or have calves. We couldn’t find your first
fifty that were rustled, figure those were sold off. But the rest are all
accounted for and their calves. You’ve still got over sixty head, come fall
you’ll probably have over eighty.

Hattie clapped her hands, then dipped her head. “Thank you,
thank you, Lord.” Beaming she smiled at him. “Thank you Jackson.”

Then he forgot what Rubye would think was proper. He reached
out and pulled her in, an arm around her shoulder. “It’s all right girl, it’s
all right. We’ll get those rustlers yet, won’t we men?”

“That’s right, Miss Stoddard. We’ll get them.”

Hattie raised her head, stared at the cowboys who had answered
as one. They met her eyes, delighted with her smiling face. To a man, they
accepted her for who and what she was, not what the gossips in town accused her
of. It was too much. Hattie raised a hand to cover her mouth, nodded and turned
to rush back toward the house.

Jackson felt a tightness in his chest that he hadn’t felt
since the night J.D. was born. He cleared his throat, looked toward his men,
then asked. “Now, what are we going to do with a second bull?”

“You mean three, don’t you, boss. That little black ones cut
him out a herd to practice on,” Tony called.

Cliff looked around, “Move this one and these cows to the
north range with the other Stoddard cows, let that long spotted bull have the
south grass, and let junior duck and dodge the way he’s been doing. Looks like
the Stoddard bull does pretty good at getting the job done.”

“No, I think Hattie’s bull will head back south, to his own
range. Might as well move them to that sector to begin with, leave the north
grass to our cows and bull. I think your plan for Junior is a good one. All
right, maybe we can keep them apart for a while. But somehow, they’ll work it
out to fight.”

“Yep, but then the best bull will win. In the meantime, we
can get some fine calves.”

“Maybe, but I’m thinking someone around here might want to
buy a good bull. Or even a young bull with potential.”

“Junior may not be as deep chested or heavy as this bruiser,
but he’ll do.”

“I’ll ask Hattie what she wants to do.”

He looked nervously back up the yard, watching as Hattie quickly
hung clothes. She could work faster and harder than two other women. Even as he
thought it, he saw her set the basket down and begin working through the huge
garden. She carried the basket on her hip from row to row as it grew heavier
with tomatoes, greens and the last of the green beans. While he watched, she
walked to the corral and stripped the beans from the plants she had pulled from
the hard soil, tossing the brown edged plants before her mules as a treat.