Tough to Kill (12 page)

She reached town in the cold of the dawn and rode straight to the hotel where she stayed always when she came to town. She knew she would not be able to stay long, because her money wouldn't hold out. The night clerk was still on duty in the lobby and he showed his surprise at the sight of her. The Markhams were big people in the country and it wasn't often that one of their women came riding into town
alone at dawn. He signed her in and gave her her usual room overlooking the street. He carried her valise up for her and said he hoped she'd be comfortable. She thanked him and he left.

She sat on the bed, feeling cold, unwashed and very much alone.

But she didn't feel alone for long. There came a gentle tap on her door and she said: “Come.”

It opened to reveal a young and shy-looking man, hat in hand and moving uneasily from one foot to another.

“Jack Owen,” she exclaimed.

“Miss Carlotta.”

“What're you doing in town?”

He didn't answer her question, but stood in the doorway humming and haing. She bade him come in and rose to close the door behind him. The action seemed to increase his embarrassment.

“I seen you ride in,” he said. “I hope you don't mind me comin' here this way.”

“Why should I?” That question seemed to disconcert him still further. She said: “Mr. Owen, aren't you in some danger here?”

“Yes,” he said. “Reckon I am. But a man can't count danger when he's courtin'.”

She found it hard to suppress a smile.

“You mean you're here to see Lucy?”

He blushed.

“Yeah,” he said.

“Will you be going back into the hills?” He nodded. “You'll be seeing Mr. McAllister?” He nodded again.

“Will you give him a message for me?” she asked.

“Sure will.”

“Tell him, I'm here in town. I've left home.”

His eyes came wide. “You broke with Markham?” It was her turn to nod. He looked everywhere but at her and started stammering. “Did - er - Miss Lucy … aw, heck, ma'am, what I mean is… did she…?”

“Did she mention you?” Carlotta said. “Is she as daffy about you as you are about her?”

He gulped, looked at her for a second and said: “Yeah, that's what I mean, I reckon.”

Carlotta went to him and laid a hand on his arm. He blushed even redder and tried to retreat from her.

“The answer to that/' Carlotta told him, “is that Lucy is a young girl and you're a young man. It's up to you. But for heaven's sake don't get yourself shot doing your courtin'.”

“That's what fazes me kinda,” he admitted. “I ain't like McAllister and McShannon. I ain't so durned partial to gettin' shot.”

“How're you going to manage to see her now?”

“I reckon I ain't gotten around to workin' on that, ma'am. But I'm goin' to see her I'm certain sure.”

“Be careful.”

He managed a small grin.

“You can bet on that,” he said.

“When will you reach camp?”

“Tomorrow some time.”

“And you'll tell Mr. McAllister?”

“Sure will.” He shuffled his feet. “Better be gettin' along now, ma'am.”

“Goodbye, Jack.”

“Bye, ma'am.”

He sort of ducked his head, stumbled on his high heels and spurs and somehow got out of the door after apparently trying to tear it from its hinges. When he was gone, Carlotta sat on her bed and somehow felt better for seeing him. She knew that he was a good friend to McAllister and it seemed that for a moment, she had contacted the man himself. She hoped that the boy wouldn't foolishly ride into trouble.

Meanwhile, Jack stumbled away down the stairs and went out onto the street. His mind was in a whirl. That Carlotta was sure some wonderful woman. She wasn't a scratch on Lucy, of course, but she sure was a humdinger. In a dream, he fetched his horse from the livery and rode out of town. His heart lifted. He was on his way to see his girl. He didn't know how he was going about that, but he was certain that he was going to do it. He was no hero, but he was a mighty stubborn man. He was going to see Lucy and then he would ride on into the hills and tell McAllister about Carlotta. Then McAllister would ride into town and take her in the face of countless odds. That sent a shudder through him, because that might mean that he and McShannon might feel impelled to go along too.

As he rode, he mulled over what he had learned in town. The sheriff had released Foley and the hardcases that McAllister had brought charges against, the Sheriff had said that no evidence was being offered. McAllister had failed to come back into town and prove that he had a case. Jack reckoned the sheriff lacked grit. He didn't blame the man, because he had to admit that he lacked grit himself.

He was riding his favorite horse, the red mustang stallion. He had caught it in the hills the year before and already several of his mares were big with foal from it. He reckoned with hope and pride that before long he would be breeding horses that men would call Owen Horses. Then he would make money a-plenty and he'd build Lucy the best house in the country. He'd buy her all the pretties any girl could want. Life was going to be wonderful.

Then he got to thinking of how he was going to see her right now and life didn't seem so rosy somehow. Markham was a pretty tough man and his riders all carried guns and knew how to use them. He hated the thought of J. Owen being a target for same.

He skirted the edge of the main valley and used all the cover he could. He was a good rough country man and he had learned a lot about using terrain to its best advantage from his years of chasing the wild ones. If you could get up close to a wild mustang without being scented or seen you could get up close to any man living. The animal he rode was all mustang, not large and rather short in the leg, but it was all horse and possessed the rare quality of stamina coupled with speed. He reckoned that if he met any of Markham's riders he could lose them if they weren't mounted on some of his thoroughbred stock. Even then he guessed that Red would give them a fair showing. And the stallion was as good as a watchdog. Once, coming out of a jumble of rocks and tangled brush he had almost ridden on top of two riders, but the red's ears warned him that there were men ahead and he halted and spotted them. He let them get well clear before he went on.

He approached the ranch headquarters from fairly high ground and to the north west so that he would have a good view of the place without being seen. He was excited, more than a little scared and sweating badly. As a dashing lover, he had to admit that he was no great snakes. But about the fair Lucy he was determined. He'd have her or he'd die for it.
Maybe if things came out right he and his partners would all be married to Markham women. That made it kind of tidy and he liked the idea.

When he reckoned that he would get a good clear view of the house through the glass, he dismounted and tied the stud in deep brush. Then he went cautiously forward to an outcropping of rock, produced the glass from his pocket and got it into focus on the house. He knew that he would have to bring into play his hunter's endless patience.

It was halfway through the morning and most of the hands had ridden out to work on the range. He saw the blacksmith at work in his shop and a boy breaking a horse in a starveout. Once he thought he saw Markham himself stride across the yard and a flutter of panic went through him even though the man was at a safe distance. Then, a little later, he saw a flutter of a skirt on the rear gallery and thought: “It's Lucy!” But it wasn't as he saw straightway from the color of the hair. It was Alvina.

Noon came.

He drank a little tepid water and chewed on a strip of jerky. Hunger didn't worry him. He had been trained in a tough school and occasional hunger didn't trouble him.

In the early part of the afternoon, the whole place seemed to go to sleep and he even started to doze himself. Maybe he did nod off, because suddenly he was wide awake and aware of something that fluttered between the house and the creek. At once he clapped the glass to one eye and there right in his view was Lucy, picking her way carefully through the long grass and the brush toward the creek.

She's going down to catch the cool air by the water
, he thought. And suddenly with a rush of gladness, he pictured himself down there with her, feeding her smooth and clever phrases, fascinating her with his wit by the gently running waters of the creek. But sense did not entirely desert him. He ran an expert eye over the countryside, assessed the cover between his present position and the creek and reckoned with a little luck he could do it.

He Indianed his way back to his horse just in case there was somebody in the house looking this way, got into the saddle and worked his way carefully back north and circled through broken country, eyes and ears alert, till he came down into the bottom land along the creek. On the soft soil of the
bottom, he made his way along the meandering creek the stud's hoofs making little or no sound. All he could hear was the horse's gentle snorts and the creek of saddle-leather.

And then suddenly, there was Lucy in front of him.

He halted the stud and looked at her for a moment, suddenly scared to death of her and yet finding her good enough to eat. Even in that moment of elation, however, he was scared enough to glance around carefully to check that he could not be seen from the house.

The stud whickered.

Lucy who was sitting on a rock, stockings and shoes off and her feet in the cool waters of the creek, looked up, startled. But only for a moment. A broad smile lit her face and she exclaimed: “Jack.”

She used his Christian name. She had only seen him the once before and here she was using his given name. He almost fell out of the saddle with delight. He got down and tied the stud with trembling hands and then he was stumbling toward her on his cowman's heels and taking his hat from his head. He tried to think of things to say as he went, but he couldn't think of a word. He went and stood in front of her, blushing. She hid her feet modestly under her wide skirts.

“Why, Mr. Owen,” she said, “I didn't think to see you here.”

“You called me Jack just now,” he blurted.

“You surprised me.”

“I been waitin' all day up in the rocks. Watchin' the house through the glass. Watchin' for you-all.”

She flushed a little, recovered herself and said coolly: “Whyever should you do that, sir?”

Jack lost his head. He was sweating profusely from excitement and a terrible sense of danger. All the time he looked at her face, her pouting full mouth and the swelling contours of her body, one half of his mind was with the oger in the house. The dual concentration was more than he could bear. He was to be forgiven for losing his head.

“There ain't no time for fancy words,” he said. “You pa and us'ns is at war. They catch me here they'll be liable to… well, heck, they ain't goin' to be too nice about it.” He dropped to one knee beside her, his face earnest and sweating.

A change came over the girl. She went to touch him and withdrew her hand again.

“You shouldn't have come,” she said.

“I had to,” he told her. “Look, ma'am. I ain't beatin' about the bush. I'm crazy about you-all. There ain't no other woman in the world for me but you.”

“You only saw me once.”

“That was enough.”

“And you risked my father and all the riders just to tell me that.”

“I reckon.”

“You must be a brave man.”

“I ain't. I'm a double-died two-toned coward, ma'am. Lucy. Can I call you Lucy?”

“And you came here all the way for that? Mr. McShannon came here to see Alvina and Mr. McAllister came to see Carlotta but from all accounts they came for more than that.”

Jack looked at her in astonishment. He didn't know what to say or where to look.

“Shucks, ma'am,” he said.

Her full mouth was pouting again. He was sweating still, but for a new reason. He didn't know how he kept his hands off her.

She shifted her seat and the movement brought her very close to him. He wanted to move away and he wanted to move closer, both at the same time. Hell, he thought, this was a sight worse than wrastlin' a wild one.

He knew that she wanted him to kiss her, but it seemed impossible that a wonderful creature like her would want a wild and woolly horse hunter like him to actually kiss her. Something impelled his head forward and down, his mouth fell on hers and it was like touching rose petals that suddenly burst into flame. Then his arms were around her and when he expected her to pull away from him or slap his face she seemed to hurl herself at him bodily, grasping him to her. Before he knew what had happened, they were both on the ground and their bodies fitting together like component parts. Fiery ecstasy flared through him. He could not clasp her to him close enough, he could never have enough of her mouth and her fury matched his. The girl he had taken to be a lovely and slightly aloof young lady turned miraculously into a delicious and tempting little animal.

Gasping, at last, they took their mouths from each other and took stock of the objects of their passion.

“Aw, honey,” Jack said.

“Oh, Jack, Jack, Jack,” Lucy said.

“Why didn't I come sooner?” he demanded angrily.

“Next time make it sooner and more often,” she admonished just as angrily.

Fear of her had left him totally; his whole body sang like a song; life was suddenly altogether wonderful. As the girl had been transformed in his eyes, so his picture of himself was transformed. No longer was he a no account horse hunter - he was a man that a girl like this could love.

His hand was at her breast and her hand came up to hold it there. She sighed and looked as though she would weep for sheer physical happiness.

He kissed her again. Her mouth opened and clung to his.