Dawn Comes Early (24 page)

The question seemed to surprise him. “I haven't got me a fancy education. Not like you.”

“You don't need a fancy education,” she said. “You just need to write.”

“I've been doing that.” He gave her a sheepish look. “I spend most of my nights writing. If I'd gotten more sleep I probably wouldn't have forgotten to close the gate.”

She couldn't help but sympathize. She'd had her share of absentmindedness when working on a book. “Does your brother know you want to be a writer?” she asked.

“He knows.” He shrugged. “Luke knows how to make things out of iron. He don't cotton to making things out of words.”

“Hammering out words is not so different from pounding out iron,” she said. Sometimes the words came easy, but more often than not a writer had to work at them.

“I don't think Luke sees it that way.” He cleared his throat. “I was wondering, ma'am, if you'd be kind enough to look at something I wrote?”

Flattered by what he asked of her, she nonetheless hesitated. “You do know I'm not writing anymore.”

He looked surprised. “If I could write like you I would never give up.”

“I'm not that good.” Since working at the ranch she now cringed at the errors she'd made. In one of her books she described a herd of
bulls
. In another, she had her heroine feed her horse
straw
. Then there was that lariat/lasso mix-up. Even now she had to think which one was the noun.

“You're good,” he said. “And I'm not just sayin' that to be nice or anything.”

He sounded so earnest she couldn't help but smile. “I'd be honored to read your work.”

He looked pleased and then skeptical. “Are you sure it won't be too much trouble? I'm not much of a speller and my punctuation gave my old teacher Miss Gimble conniptions.”

He cited more reasons why she might not wish to help him, but never mentioned what she suspected was the real one. Each word on a page was like a little window opening up the secrets of a writer's heart. Writing was the easy part. The hard part was releasing it to the prying eyes of others.

“. . . and I'm not sure the ending is right and you may not even like that kind of story and . . .”

Head askance, she waited for him to either pause for breath or run out of excuses. “Are you finished?” she asked at last.

“Eh. I think so.”

“Good. I'll read your writing. But right now we better get to work before we're both in trouble.”

He grinned, gave a nod, and, clutching his hat to his chest, took off running. Envying his exuberance, she couldn't help but smile as she headed for the tack room. Her encounter with Luke's brother got her thinking.

As much as she enjoyed writing, she got more satisfaction from working on the ranch. She loved riding the range and racing the wind. Nothing pleased her as much as the wide-open spaces and the feeling of camaraderie when herding cattle with the other cowpunchers. She loved the idea that one day the Last Chance Ranch would be hers, and her mind fairly danced with new ideas on how she would run it.

Miss Walker's aloof managing style was not what she envisioned for herself. She dreamed of filling the ranch house with guests. She might even extend an invitation to that annoying classmate of hers who looked down her nose at anyone not owning property.

On Declaration Day and the Fourth of July she would plan picnics. At Christmas she would invite ranch workers and their families to the main house for roast beef and all the trimmings.

Ah, yes. When Miss Kate Tenney took over the Last Chance Ranch, things would be different.

Ruckus called to her from atop his horse. “We got a fire over yonder. Stay here and start muckin' out the stables.” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder to the north. A column of smoke spiraled from the ground to the sky.

He took off after Stretch, Feedbag, and the rest of the ranch hands. No sooner had he ridden away than Miss Walker mounted her horse and chased after them. Hands on her waist, Kate watched her. She envied the ease with which Miss Walker and her horse moved as one.

Sighing, Kate stared at the black smoke in the distance. A fire? After all that rain? It didn't seem possible but smoke didn't lie.

She chewed on her bottom lip. What if they didn't put it out in time? What if it burned a path to the ranch house? Or even started a stampede? It might even burn all the way to town and . . . Worried now, she headed for the tack room for her saddle. The stables could wait. Her job was putting out the fire with the rest of them, and as the future owner of the Last Chance Ranch, that's what she intended to do.

The thought terrified her, but it was high time she faced her foe—just like the windmill faced the wind in Longfellow's poem. Ruckus had said she was one of the men—and she intended to prove him right. With grim determination she ran the rest of the way.

The tack room was dark except for a stream of sunlight from the single window.

A strange feeling came over her. Goose bumps traveled along her arms and she almost lost her nerve. Berating herself, she balled her hands and gritted her teeth, determined to conquer her fear of fire.

She reached for her saddle. Something—a sound. She spun around and gasped.

The outlaw Cactus Joe stood behind her, blocking the door, a wide grin on his swarthy face. “We meet again.”

Chapter 21

W
hen Luke opened for business that morning, Uncle Sam was waiting outside the shop. Homer greeted Luke's uncle with wagging tail.

“Hello, boy.” Uncle Sam leaned sideways to pet the dog so as not to bend his bad back.

Luke eyed him with more than a little concern. Not only was it unusual for Uncle Sam to drive into town this early since his retirement, his face looked drawn as if he'd not been sleeping well.

Luke thought the world of the man. Everything Luke knew about the blacksmithing trade he learned from his uncle. It was a bittersweet day when Uncle Sam turned over the business to him. Said he wanted to try his hand at wood carving, but Luke knew his uncle simply couldn't adjust to the changing times. He considered ready-made tools, door hinges, and other household necessities an affront to his blacksmithing skills, and had even gone so far as to ban mail-order catalogs from his household.

“What brings you here so early?” Luke asked. “Is Aunt Bessie all right?”

Uncle Sam straightened. “Depends what you mean by all right.” He pointed to the mug in Luke's hand. “You don't happen to have any more Arbuckle's, do you?”

“Upstairs. I'll get you some.”

Luke returned from his upstairs dwelling a few moments later with a steaming cup of coffee. Uncle Sam had his hand on the anvil.

“I remember the day I found this meteor,” he said. “A couple nights earlier we saw this light streak across the sky and some of us boys decided to hunt for it. It took me three days but I found it. You ain't gonna find a better anvil than this, not anywhere.”

Luke handed his uncle the cup of the steaming brew and listened patiently to the story that had been told perhaps a hundred, two hundred times through the years. He knew his uncle would eventually get around to telling him the real reason for his early morning visit and he was willing to wait. It was the least he could do for the man who had treated him more like a son than a nephew and had even given him his name.

Uncle Sam blew on the hot coffee and took a sip. “Just what I needed,” he said. He glanced at the broken handle of a water pump. “They don't make things like they used to, do they?”

“'Fraid not.”

His uncle studied the miniature windmill centered on Luke's workbench. “How's it coming along?” Luke and his uncle had been discussing a new design for windmills.

“I still can't figure out how to make it flexible enough to lower to the ground, and strong enough to hold up to the wind.”

“Hmm.” His uncle glanced around the shop. He offered no thoughts on how to get around the wind problem, which further convinced Luke something was not right.

“Do you know of anyone other than a blacksmith who works with the four elements—fire, air, earth, and water?”

“I don't know. Glassblowers maybe?” Luke said. Where was his uncle heading with this?

Abruptly Uncle Sam got to the point. “Have you seen your Aunt Bessie recently?”

“A couple of days ago. Why?”

“How did she seem to you?”

Luke shrugged. “She seemed fine.” Her usual meddling self. “Why? Is something wrong?”

“I don't know. Somethin's gotten into her and it ain't right.”

Alarmed, Luke set his coffee mug on his workbench. “What do you mean? Is she sickly?”

“No, nothin' like that. It's just that all of a sudden she's very demandin'. Affectionate-wise, I mean. Why, the other night she insisted I peck her on the cheek for no good reason.”

Luke didn't know what to say. It wasn't like his uncle to talk about personal matters. “Is that a bad thing?”

“That's what I don't know.” Uncle Sam lowered his voice. “When an animal changes its habits, it means somethin's not right. You never know what it means with a woman.” He took another sip of his coffee. “She even dresses different. What do you call that slippery fabric?”

Luke scratched his head. “I don't know. Silk? Satin?”

“Satin, that's it. When she walks, her nightshirt sounds like rustling grass. I thought someone had left the front door open. But that's the least of it. The other night she was so slippery she plumb slid right out of bed. A body could get herself kilt wearin' that stuff.”

“It sure don't sound like her,” Luke said slowly. “So what do you figure is going on?”

Uncle Sam considered the question for a moment. “Years ago, when me and your aunt first got hitched, I saw this real purty Mexican woman in Tucson. I didn't mess up or anything, but I was tempted. I prayed to God like I never prayed before to lead me from that temptation, and he did.”

“You done the right thing.”

“I know, but I couldn't stop feeling guilty. So I went out and bought your aunt the best frying pan money could buy. I'm tellin' you, Luke, temptation is bad, but guilt is worse. So here's what I'm thinkin'. Your aunt feels guilty about something. Do you suppose she's got her eye on someone else?”

Luke's eyes widened. “Aunt Bessie?”

“I'm thinkin' it might be Jeb Parker.”

Luke couldn't believe his uncle was serious. Far as he knew his aunt didn't even like the postmaster. “You're wrong.”

“I'm not so sure 'bout that. She's always coming up with reasons to order from that snake oil catalog even though she knows how I feel about it.”

Luke blinked. “Aunt Bessie's ordering from Montgomery Ward?”

Uncle Sam nodded. “Hard to believe, ain't it? She don't know that I know. The way I figure it, it gives her an excuse to keep going to the post office. Do you think that's what she's up to? Do you think she's got her sights set on Parker?”

Luke shook his head. “Aunt Bessie is a fine Christian woman. She would never look at another man.”

“Stranger things have happened. The thing is, I don't know what to do about it.”

Luke ran his fingers through his hair. For the life of him he couldn't imagine his aunt interested in anyone else. His uncle was mistaken. Had to be. “Maybe you should spruce yourself up a bit. Show her your good side.”

Truth be told his uncle wore his clothes until they practically fell off him. He'd still be wearing the same boots he wore in the War Between the States had his aunt not put her foot down and insisted he buy another pair.

“You figure that would help?”

“Couldn't hurt,” Luke said, though he was a fine one to give advice. He much preferred his old clothes to new.

His uncle ran his hands over his bristly chin. “Maybe I'll stop at the barber for a haircut and shave on the way home.”