Fiddlefoot (3 page)

Frank grimaced and looked at his bread. “I'll have to grow me some mustaches and a belly.”

Carrie said lightly, “I'd trade both of them for a couple of roots.” As soon as it was out, she regretted saying it. She got out a plate of cold steaks and a dish of cold fried potatoes and set them, along with a pitcher of milk, on the table, and then looked at Frank.

He was watching her, his eyes serious, and said, “All right. I'll grow roots, too.”

Carrie poured herself a glass of milk and sat down opposite Frank. He ate silently, swiftly for a moment, and then said, “I'll tell you a story.” He raised his fork, and pointed it at her, a frown on his forehead.

Carrie laughed. “Empty your mouth first.”

Fork still in the air, Frank chewed a moment on a bite of steak and swallowed it, then waved the fork at her. “I was crossing Roan Creek this morning when I remembered that string of trout pools in Wells Canyon. I cut over to take a look at them—at one pool especially. I've fished it ever since I was a kid, and for one fish.” He paused, and lowered his fork. “He's still there.”

“The same fish?”

Frank nodded. “The same fish.” He looked at his plate, scowling. “That got me to thinking.”

“How fat, dumb and happy he was for staying in the same pool?” Carrie asked dryly.

Frank glanced up, a faint shock in his eyes, and Carrie thought swiftly, miserably,
Why do I do that?

“Yeah,” Frank said slowly. “I kind of like him for that, Carrie. I don't think I'll try to catch him any more.”

A faint exasperation stirred in Carrie. Fat, dumb and happy had been her own words, but Frank had accepted them, and they described, she thought bitterly, his opinion of men who stayed in the same place for a lifetime. She felt the old skepticism, the old disbelief in him coming back like a wave of nausea, and it frightened her. It laid its dead hand on every hour of her life, and she hated it.

She rose now and went to the counter and cut out a wedge of berry pie, put it on a plate, and returned to the table. Sitting down, she said, “Then you weren't in such a hurry to get back.”

“No, I wanted Rob buried,” Frank said.

Carrie looked at him pleadingly. “Don't, Frank. He's dead.”

“Good,” Frank said. He glanced up to see the distaste in Carrie's eyes, and now he shoved the plate of pie away from him. He looked at her levelly and murmured, “I guess we fight tonight.”

“Is that new?” Carrie asked bitterly, softly.

Frank reached across the table and took her hand, and his eyes were serious, without humor and without mockery, and Carrie felt a tenseness gather within her. She knew that look in him, and she knew she could not resist it. He said now, “I want to say a lot of things tonight, Carrie. I'm going to, if you won't jump down my throat.”

Carrie nodded mutely.

A kind of shadow crawled up into Frank's eyes as he said, “Don't ever expect me to be sorry about Rob dying, or even say I am. There hasn't a dog died in this town in ten years that wasn't mourned more than Rob will be. I know it, and you know it, so let's say it.”

Carrie nodded again.

Frank's swift smile came and went, and he was again serious.

“But I got Saber from him. I'm going to keep it and I'm going to work it.”

He looked at Carrie levelly, waiting, and she didn't move.

“So I think we ought to get married,” Frank said.

Carrie regarded him a few bleak seconds, and then withdrew her hand and rose. She said, in as light a voice as she could manage, “Eat your pie, son. You're lightheaded.”

She walked over to the counter, and with her back to Frank stood there, her fists clenched, fighting the turmoil inside her. She had waited for this, dreading it, knowing it was coming, and now it was here. She could answer it and end it by simply turning around and saying, “All right,” and that was what she had ached to do for five years. But something in her now, as before, told her that it was too easy, and that it would be fatal.

She heard Frank rise, gather up his dishes, take them to the sink and pump water on them. When she turned, her face stiff and expressionless, he was standing by the sink, rolling a cigarette. Without looking at her he said, “You used to laugh when you said no, Carrie. Now you're mad.”

“It isn't funny any more, Frank.”

Frank dropped his cigarette, pushed away from the sink and came up to her. He put his hand under her chin and tilted it back and waited until she looked at him. “It never was,” he said quietly. “I've always meant it.”

Carrie reached up and removed his hand and held it between hers. “It's too easy, Frank. I like fairy stories, but I don't believe in them.”

“This is one?”

Carrie dipped her head in affirmation.

“The Young Prince who quarrels with the King and leaves? When the King dies, the Young Prince returns to marry the Princess and live happily ever after? Yes, that's one.”

“But what if it's so?”

“I want to prove it
with
you,” Frank said desperately. “You love me. You can't hide that from me.”

“And you love me—when you think of it,” Carrie said quietly.

“I'll think of it.” He put both hands on her arms and shook her gently. “Carrie, don't look back. We've got Saber. I'll settle down and work it, and we'll have a life nobody's had before. We'll—”

He paused, because Carrie had gently disengaged his hands. She backed off a step now, and said, “You almost make me believe you, Frank—almost.” She watched the pain mount in his dark eyes, and knew it was matched in her own, but she went on implacably, “I've waited five years. I'll wait a little longer—until my heart and my head make sense to each other.”

There was bitterness in Frank's voice as he said, “And your head says what, Carrie?”

She shook her head. “You wouldn't like to know.”

“I want to.”

Carrie took a deep breath, because she knew this would hurt, because it was all the truth about him she had learned in these five years. “That you're not only a born drifter, Frank, but that you're a featherweight. That you've never dared try yourself the way a real man must try himself, to find out what he can bear and how he can fight and what he can break. That you run, that you hide or dodge from any trouble that doesn't lie down on its back and roll over when you smile so handsomely.” She hesitated. “I—I guess I've said enough.”

Frank only nodded, and Carrie was appalled by what she had said. All the life had gone out of his face, all the careless, easy vitality was vanished.

Carrie came to him swiftly then, wrapping her arms around his chest and burying her face in his shirt. “Oh, Frank, don't you see? I've got to know! I'd rather eat my heart out here than have you break it at Saber. I'm not much, but you've got to earn me. You've got to be that fair!”

She felt his hand in her hair and heard him say softly, musingly, “Sure.”

There were footsteps on the stairs now, and Carrie knew her father was coming down for his evening walk. She came away from Frank now, and glanced briefly at him, and he gave her his old quick careless smile before he moved around the table and out into the hall. Remembering the smile, Carrie thought bleakly,
It didn't stick. It never will
.

Moving over to the lamp, she blew it out and heard Frank and her father exchange greetings. She went out into the hall in time to hear her father say, “Had something to eat, Frank?”

“I fed him, Dad,” Carrie said. “Do you want to talk to him?”

Her father was a spare, gray tall man with a taciturnity in his face that was belied by the mildness of his eyes. He wore a rumpled black suit which was seldom pressed, yet there was an unbending dignity about him that clothes couldn't alter. He had never by word or gesture been anything but courteous to Frank, but now Carrie saw the brief measuring glance he gave Frank and read the distrust there.

“No, my business can wait. It's pretty dull.” To Frank he said, “I suppose Carrie told you you're Saber's sole owner now. I'm Rob's executor, and we'll have papers to sign.”

Frank nodded, and asked idly, “Who saw Rob afterwards, Judge?”

Judge Tavister looked at him sharply. “I didn't hear. The usual people, I suppose—coroner, sheriff, and jury.” When Frank said nothing, her father looked at her. “Well, I'm going for my walk. Good night, Frank.”

“Be careful of those flowerpots,” Carrie said.

“I know. I've been hurdling the damned things for years.”

Carrie smiled and looked at Frank, but he was watching the Judge's disappearing back with a sober thoughtfulness. When her father was out of sight, Carrie said, “Why did you ask him about Rob?”

Frank shrugged, and when he looked at her the old impudence and mockery and fun was back in his face. “Practicing,” he murmured. “I'll have to talk to my father-in-law about something.” He came over and kissed her and said, “I'll be back from Saber as soon as I can.”

She went to the door with him and watched him pick his way through the geraniums, and then she leaned against the door-jamb until he had mounted and ridden out. Afterwards she sorted out the promises he had made her tonight, weighing them against other promises he had made in the past. Presently, she said aloud to the night and to herself, in a discouraged voice, “Maybe,” and went inside.

Chapter 3

At the corner, Frank turned in the saddle and saw Carrie's small figure outlined against the light in the hall. When he faced ahead again, he shook his head once in dislike of the gray and troubling thoughts within him. There was no way to explain to her that the words he had used once did not have the same meaning now, that a promise given and broken ten times could be kept the eleventh. No, he had used that coin with her until it had no value, and he must start over, now, and he accepted this tranquilly in the quiet night.

In the middle of the next block, he saw the dim figure of Judge Tavister halted on the sidewalk in the deep shade of the roadside trees. The Judge came out to the road and called quietly, “Frank,” and Frank kneed his sorrel over to the edge of the street.

Judge Tavister was carrying his hat; in the almost unbroken darkness, Frank could not see the expression on his face.

“Why did you ask that question about Rob?” Judge Tavister asked him.

“Somebody said Hannan isn't sure Rob's death was an accident.”

“What else did somebody say?”

Frank hesitated, reluctant to say this. “That Hannan might suspect me of his murder.”

There was a long silence, and then Judge Tavister said, “Frank, what did you and Rob have that last quarrel about?”

“My general uselessness,” Frank said tonelessly. “He wanted me to work under Jess until I knew Saber's business. I already knew it, and I wouldn't stay around him.” He paused, groping for words, and then said wanly, “One thing led to another.”

“Fists?”

“No,” Frank said quickly. “He hit me, and I let him.” He was remembering now. “He said he was sorry he'd ever gone near the wagon train and found me. Said he was sorry the Utes didn't get me along with my folks. He said they must have known I'd do more damage to the whites than fifty Indians, and that's why they let me live. He said—” He hesitated.

“Yes?” Judge Tavister prompted mildly.

Frank shifted in the saddle and said in a dull matter-of-fact voice: “He said before he buried my mother he looked for a wedding ring and couldn't find it. She wore other rings, but no wedding ring. He said she looked as if she came out of a House—a cheap House.”

“Ah,” Judge Tavister said, a faint disgust in his voice. “Does Hannan have to know he said that?”

“He knows it,” Frank said shortly. “Rob said it in the bunk-house in front of the whole crew. I left then.”

There was an unrunning silence, and then Judge Tavister said gently, “Why didn't you stay away, Frank?”

“Carrie,” Frank answered promptly.

“That's the reason you should have,” Judge Tavister said softly.

“That's the way you've felt all along, isn't it, Judge?”

“No man likes to see his child unhappy,” the Judge said quietly. “He'll change it if he can.”

“You can't.”

“You'll have a lot of offers for Saber,” Judge Tavister went on. “That always happens when a man dies. Take the best offer and get out. This is a big country—as I think you've proved to yourself.”

“And run away once more,” Frank murmured.

“Yes. From what you're bound to hurt.”

Frank tried to see Judge Tavister's face in the darkness and could not. He said slowly, “If I hurt her again, I'll go.”

“What if you can't help but hurt her again?”

Frank scowled, turning this over in his mind, making many things of it. “Speak plainer, Judge.”

“All right, what if Hannan decides rightly or wrongly that you murdered Rob. It could happen. You've got a reputation around here for being good-natured, good-looking and good-for-nothing, Frank, and people will envy you getting Saber. What if you wait it out in jail for a trial? The verdict doesn't matter. What about Carrie then?”

There was, Frank saw, a bitter truth in all this, and yet there was something else too that the Judge didn't see. “If I sell Saber and drift, that's admitting I'm afraid of what Hannan will turn up. It's admitting I'm not worth much.”

“I'm not interested in it.”

“Even if I'm innocent?”

Judge Tavister was silent a long, long moment, as if he were searching his mind for the most honest of answers. “No,” he said then, a strange implacability in his voice, “Not even then. Because you really aren't worth anything, Frank—not even an hour's unhappiness for Carrie.”