The Reluctant Bride Page 19

  “I’m going to be here two months at most. I can’t—”

  “It might not take that long. He wouldn’t have brought you here if he didn’t like and trust you. You’ve got to help me.”

  “I don’t have to help you,” Tanzy said, irritated at being put on the spot. “You lied to me when you wrote those letters for Russ.”

  But her arguments weren’t carrying any more weight with her than they were with Welt. She liked Russ. She was going to be here anyway. If she could do anything to help restore his faith in women, why shouldn’t she?

  “Okay,” she said, “but you’ve got to understand I’m doing it only because he’s been nice to me about this whole mess.”

  “Fine. I don’t care why you’re doing it as long as you do it.”

  “I’ll make sure he understands from the beginning that I’m leaving as soon as I have enough money to go somewhere else, so don’t you say anything that might lead him to think otherwise.”

  “I won’t.”

  “I don’t trust you. You’ve lied to us both.”

  “I just want you to make him believe he’s the kind of man a nice, respectable woman would be proud to marry.”

  “I can’t believe the women around here are so stupid they haven’t figured that out for themselves. Maybe it’s a good thing he hasn’t married anybody from Boulder Gap. It would be a shame for Russ’s kids to be morons.”

  Tanzy spent the rest of the morning reorganizing the pantry and making a list of things she needed. That afternoon she started cleaning the kitchen. Welt might be a decent cook, but she’d never met a man who understood what it meant to have a clean kitchen. Tomorrow she’d start on the house. After that she’d tackle the men’s clothes. At some point she’d have to clean up the men themselves, but that was down the road. One step at a time.

  How did you restore a man’s faith in women in a few months when its destruction had been going on all his life? It wasn’t as if she could perform some heroic act or demonstrate sterling character in the kitchen. She guessed she could begin being the best cook and housekeeper she could possibly be. And she’d make sure Russ could read by the time she left.

  While she was thinking about his future, she’d better spare a few thoughts for her own. She had to figure out what she was going to do when she left Boulder Gap. Twice she’d run off without a good plan. She didn’t intend to do it a third time.

  Welt stuck his head in the doorway. “You’d better come out. You’ve got visitors.”

  “Who?” Tanzy asked. She had grease smeared over her arms and her clothes. She expected she probably had some on her face, too, and the cloth she’d tied around her hair. She was in no condition to receive visitors, not even dusty cowboys.

  “Come see for yourself,” Welt replied unhelpfully before disappearing.

  Tanzy got up from her knees, where she’d been struggling with a badly encrusted oven. Whoever it was, her visitors had come uninvited, so they would have to take her as they found her. She stepped outside and saw Welt lounging in a chair under the porch roof.

  “Where are they?” she asked.

  He pointed in the direction of the trees under which she and Russ had stood talking the night before and was horrified to see Stocker approaching in a buggy with Ethel Peters seated next to him.

  “Oh my God! What are they doing here?”

  “Come to save your virtue, I expect,” Welt offered.

  It irritated Tanzy that they could be so officious as to think they could tell her what to do, but she was touched they thought enough of her to be concerned for her welfare and safety.

  “They can’t think I’m going to drive any man crazy with lust looking like this.” Her own words surprised her. She was startled she could speak so openly about lust to any man, especially one she’d met only the day before.

  They think we’re determined to ravish any woman unfortunate enough to fall into our clutches.”

  “I wonder what argument they’ll present to convince me to go back with them.”

  Stocker hadn’t pulled the buggy to a halt before Ethel, her face a mask of horror, exclaimed, “What have they done to you?”

  “I’ve been trying to clean the stove,” Tanzy said, smiling when she realized Ethel took her appearance as proof her worst fears had been realized. “Men have no idea of cleanliness when it comes to a kitchen.”

  “You shouldn’t be doing work like that,” Stocker said.

  “Of course I should. I’m the cook. I’ll be the housekeeper, too, once I get the kitchen clean and the provisions properly organized.”

  “You can’t stay here,” Ethel said. “It’s not safe.”

  Tanzy approached the buggy. “If you mean my reputation isn’t safe, you’re wrong. It’s already ruined. Betty Hicks saw to that.”

  “I’m quite prepared to believe she lied,” Ethel said.

  “She didn’t. I did work in that gambling hall, but my virtue was intact when I left, just as it will be when I leave here.”

  “You can’t trust Russ Tibbolt or any man who’d work for him,” Stocker said. “They’re all liars, thieves, and ex-convicts.”

  “I don’t have to trust them. I sleep in the cabin, they sleep in the bunkhouse, and Tardy sleeps on the couch outside my door.”

  “Who’s to say you can trust that boy?” Stocker asked.

  “My nephew is very unsatisfactory in many ways,” Ethel said, her voice steely, “but he would not violate a respectable woman. Nor would he allow anyone else to do so.”

  “He couldn’t stop Russ.”

  “He wouldn’t have to,” Welt said. “The rest of us would do it for him.”

  “I’m sorely disappointed in you, Welt Allard,” Ethel said. “You know your being out here is breaking your parents’ hearts.”

  “I won’t have anything to do with folks who lie so they can put a man they don’t like in prison. My parents bought into the lie just like the rest of the sycophants who are so afraid of Stocker they’ll do anything he says.”

  “You calling me a liar, son?” Stocker said.

  “You’re damned right. I did ten years ago. Nothing’s changed since.”

  Stocker reached for the rifle lying across his lap, but Tanzy moved between him and Welt.

  “If you’re thinking of challenging him to a gunfight,” Tanzy said, “I’d advise against it. If Welt doesn’t kill you, one of the others will.”

  “You can’t approve of such violence,” Ethel said.

  “I don’t approve of any violence, but neither do I approve of Stocker reaching for his gun because somebody said something he didn’t like.”

  “He called me a liar.”

  “I would think a man of your wealth and reputation could afford to ignore anything people said about you.”

  “A man’s got to protect his reputation.”

  “Killing Welt won’t prove you’re not a liar. It’ll just lead to more killing.”

  “Help me down, Stocker,” Ethel said. “I must talk to Tanzy. I can’t allow her to remain in such a dangerous situation.”

  “You’d better come in, too,” Tanzy said to Stocker. “I don’t want to leave you alone with Welt. Things are some-what disorganized in here,” Tanzy said when they were inside. “I’m still working on the kitchen.”

  “Is that where you sleep?” Ethel asked, pointing to the door beside the fireplace.

  “Yes. You can see for yourself there are no windows and this is the only way in.”

  “No one will believe that you could live alone with five men without compromising yourself,” Stocker said.

  “It’s possible I could talk the committee into reinstating you as the teacher,” Ethel volunteered.

  “You can work for me,” Stocker said.

  “And have everybody whispering behind my back? If they believe I can’t remain virtuous for two months, they won’t believe I managed it for one week either, or even one night. And as for your offer,” she said, turning to Stocker, “the men woul
d assume I’d been compromised, or tell themselves I had been, so they wouldn’t feel guilty for trying to do it themselves. So you see, I really have nowhere to go if I leave.”

  Ethel and Stocker used every argument they could think of to persuade Tanzy to return to Boulder Gap with them. She listened politely, then explained why none of their solutions was an improvement on her present situation. In the end, she thanked them for their concern but said she had committed herself to this job and felt compelled to honor her word.

  “A commitment to a lying thief doesn’t count,” Stocker said.

  “I’m not convinced Russ is nearly as bad as you believe,” she said. “He’s been nothing but kind to me and Tardy.”

  “Where is my nephew?” Ethel demanded, as though she’d only now remembered him. “He must return with me immediately.”

  “Russ is teaching him how to become a cowhand.”

  “How to rustle cows, you mean,” Stocker said.

  “No, I mean how to ride a horse and handle a rope. But I expect at some point he’ll teach him how to protect his cows from rustlers.”

  “You can’t believe Russ isn’t stealing cows from everybody within a hundred miles,” Stocker asserted.

  “I’ve seen no proof he is. And as far as I know, neither have you.”

  “I don’t need proof. I know”

  “I could say I don’t need proof, that I know he’s not rustling cattle. Which one of us would be right?”

  “You’re a very stubborn young woman.”

  “And you’re a hate-filled old man.”

  “That’s because Russ Tibbolt killed my brother.”

  “Welt says it was a fair fight.”

  “He’s a liar.”

  “He believes it enough to have turned his back on his family and the easy life they could offer him. I saw the way the men in town acted that day when you mentioned sending Russ to prison. They wouldn’t look each other in the eye. Something is wrong with what happened back then, and people in Boulder Gap know it.” She turned from Stocker to Ethel. “I appreciate your concern for me, but I’m staying here. I’ll tell Tardy you were here and that you want him to come home, but I won’t have any hand in influencing his decision. Now, I don’t want to be rude, but I have to start supper so it will be ready when the men return.”

  She stood. Ethel, accepting defeat, stood reluctantly.

  “I should take you back by force,” Stocker said, still seated.

  “You can console yourself with the knowledge that you did your best to help me.”

  Stocker stood and stalked out of the cabin.

  “I hope you’re not making a fata! mistake,” Ethel said.

  “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. These men are much better than people believe.”

  “You’ve only been here one day.”

  “It doesn’t take that long to sense evil. There’s none here.”

  “For your sake, I hope you’re right.”

  There was no more to be said, though Tanzy believed Ethel would have tried. She followed her guests outside to find Russ and Stocker facing each other like tomcats, spoiling for a fight.

  “By rights it’s my land,” Stocker was saying.

  “You didn’t even know it was here until I put cows on it,” Russ said.

  “You’re a liar and a thief,” Stocker shouted.

  “I could say the same thing about you,” Russ replied.

  “That’s the second time today I’ve been called a liar,” Stocker shouted. “I won’t stand for it again.”

  He went for his gun.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Tanzy and Ethel screamed as one, and Tardy jumped in front of Russ. Stocker’s gun was pointing directly at the boy. Almost in the same breath Russ grabbed Tardy and threw them both to the ground.

  “Put the gun away, Stocker,” Welt said. “I’ve got a rifle pointed right at your heart.”

  For a moment the scene froze in Tanzy’s mind: Stocker standing with his gun in hand, Russ and Tardy on the ground, Tardy with an expression of shock and Russ with one of unbridled fury, Welt standing beside the cabin, his rifle to his shoulder. Russ had somehow managed to pull Tardy aside with his left hand while drawing his gun with his right. Everyone was within point-blank range. If a gunfight started, at least two people would be dead.

  Tanzy didn’t realize she’d moved until she heard herself speaking. She snatched the gun from Stocker’s hands. “I can’t believe you’d pull a gun on a boy who’s never done anything to harm you.”

  “I wasn’t going to shoot him,” Stocker said, suddenly recovering from his shock. “I was going to shoot that tying thief,” he said, indicting Russ.

  “It would have been murder, and I would have testified to that fact,” Tanzy said.

  “So would I,” Ethel said. She hurried to where Tardy was scrambling to his feet, embarrassment and anger battling for supremacy in his eyes. “Are you hurt?” she asked.

  “No thanks to that crazy fool,” Tardy said, impatient with his aunt’s concern.

  “Don’t call me a fool,” Stocker thundered. Reflexively he reached for his gun.

  “Don’t you have any other reaction to hearing things you don’t like?” Tanzy asked, fury and scorn mixed in her voice.

  “It’s his fault,” Stocker said, pointing to Russ, who had holstered his gun, gotten to his feet, and was brushing the dirt off his clothes. “Seeing him free to keep on lying and stealing makes me want to do something crazy.”

  “If you really believe that, find the evidence to prove what you say.”

  “He’s too clever.”

  “That’s a poor excuse for doing nothing.”

  “He’s not rustling,” Tardy said. “I rode all over this valley today and there’s not a single cow that isn’t Russ’s.”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Stocker said. “You’re a stupid little boy.”

  “He’s neither,” Russ said, putting his hand on Tardy’s shoulder and giving it a squeeze. “He’s a quick study. I never had to show him anything more than once.”

  “I lassoed a calf, Aunt Ethel,” Tardy said, pride making him stand a couple of inches taller. “Russ said I shouldn’t try to wrestle it to the ground until I got more muscle, but I’m already doing that. Every muscle in my body aches. Russ says that means they’re growing.”

  “I can’t say I’m pleased with your accomplishments,” Ethel said, “but I am glad you’ve survived your foolish decision unhurt. Now it’s time to come home and stop playing cowboy.”

  “I’m not playing cowboy,” Tardy said, incensed. “I’m going to be one. Russ says I’m a natural.”

  “I don’t care what that man says,” Ethel replied. “This is not a suitable place for a boy of your age. Nor is he a man whose company I want you to share. You will come home immediately.”

  “Why? You don’t like me. You’re always saying my mom and dad probably got themselves killed just so they could get away from me.”

  Ethel looked mortified. “I only say those things when I’m angry. You are my Christian responsibility.”

  “Well, you’re not responsible for me anymore.”

  “Maybe you should consider going home,” Russ said quietly. “When you’re a little older—”

  “Getting older isn’t going to make any difference,” Tardy said. “If you don’t want me, I’ll find somebody who does.”

  “It’s not a question of me wanting you,” Russ said. “It’s a question of what’s right for you.”

  “This is,” Tardy said, excitement shining in his eyes. “I’ve never had more fun than I had today. I know you didn’t let me do anything hard or dangerous, and I know being a good cowhand is hard work, but it’s what I want to do.”

  They were quickly approaching an impasse. Tanzy felt both Tardy and Ethel had good arguments, but both couldn’t win.

  “Why don’t you let him stay a few more days?” she said to Ethel. “He’ll be going into town with me for supplies
soon. That will give him time to consider whether he really wants to stay.”

  “I won’t change my mind,” Tardy said.

  “Quiet,” Tanzy heard Russ whisper in Tardy’s ear. “She’s trying to help.”

  Ethel was clearly unhappy with the compromise.

  “You ought to bring the sheriff out here,” Stocker said. “He can force Russ to let the boy go home.”

  “If Tardy changes his mind,” Tanzy said, “I’ll be the first one to encourage him to return home.”

  “You’ll never get the boy away from him,” Stocker said, pointing at Russ. “He’ll turn him into a thief and a rustler.”

  “Have you ever thought,” Russ said to Stocker, “that if I pulled my gun every time you called me a liar, thief, and rustler, I’d have killed you a hundred times?”

  “You’d never kill me.”

  “I wasn’t faster than Toley that day, but you’re old and slow. The only way you’d beat me would be to cheat, and I don’t think you’d get another jury to lie for you.”

  “He wouldn’t get the chance,” Welt said, his rifle lowered but still in his right hand. “I’d kill him first.”

  “That would be murder,” Ethel said.

  “It would remove a great evil from Boulder Gap,” Welt said. “Then maybe people could look themselves in the mirror in the morning.”

  “I’ have no trouble facing myself in my mirror,” Ethel said.

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” Welt said. “I had some hope for you.”

  Welt’s words unsettled Ethel.

  “You’d better get started for town if you want to get there before dark,” Russ said. “I’ll ride with you to the pass.”

  “I don’t want you anywhere near me,” Stocker said.

  “I’ll go,” Welt said. “I’m not so high-minded as Russ. I’ll kill him if he tries to draw on me.”

  “I don’t want either one of you,” Stocker said. “Come on, Ethel. Let’s get out of here.”

  “Be sure you come see me when you come to town,” Ethel said to Tardy.