The Man from Stone Creek (25 page)

“They'll kill him if he proves to be deadweight, and Rex, too, since he's likely to put up a fight,” Sam said.

The outlaws mounted up and the two able men rode back up the ravine trail without a backward glance. In the flickering light of the fire lit for horse-roasting, Sam watched as Rex helped a moaning Landry into the saddle, where he bent low over the pommel.

Rex rode to the water's edge, facing the railroad car. “I don't know which one of you done this to Landry,” he called, “but I'll kill you for it, after you've suffered a while first. Kill both of you, just to make sure I got the right one.”

“It ain't true what they said about Pa and Garrett,” Landry said, choking out the words as though they were little wads of barbed wire. “It ain't true, is it, Rex?”

“It's true, all right,” Sam replied. “And I wouldn't give two whoops in hell for your chances, either, now that you've become a liability. Throw down your guns and turn yourselves in, and you might live to see the sunrise.”

Rex spat for an answer, leaned to grip the reins of his brother's horse and made for the steep trail the others had taken.

Vierra started for the door, but Sam grabbed hold of his arm and held him back.

“You'll be no good to Pilar draped over the back of your horse with your head in a sack,” Sam said.

Vierra, who had stiffened to shake loose, stood still instead. “You're right,” he said grudgingly. “The boss and his sidekick are probably waiting up there to pick us off as soon as we set foot outside this car.”

“Once Landry and Rex catch up,” Sam told him, “they'll ride on in a hurry. For now, though, I'd just as soon not make a target of myself.”

Vierra gave a great sigh and sank onto one of the other seats. He took a few moments settling himself, and then his grin flashed in the dark.

“So,” he began, “who is the lovely lady who came in on the Wednesday afternoon stage?”

V
IOLET LAY CURLED
at the foot of the narrow bed, a small, fusty ball of sorrow and pride, felled by utter exhaustion and the hasty supper Maddie had patched together after she got back from the mercantile. Hittie, too, was asleep, though fitfully so, tossing and turning, whimpering as she dreamed.

And still the oak tree searched the roof with its many twisted fingers.

Maddie kept her helpless vigil seated on an upended crate, dragged over to the bedside from the door-and-sawhorse table, her chin propped in her hands. If the Perkinses had owned a timepiece, she might have taken some comfort in the rhythmic ticking, pushing the night along, from second to second, but there was none.

Dawn was just breaking when she heard riders in the dooryard and got up to open the door. The neighbor she'd sent across the river to fetch the doctor was just reining toward home, while a squat man carrying a physician's kit climbed wearily down from the back of a burro.

Maddie's tired heart swelled with relief. She hadn't dared to consider the distinct possibility that the doctor would refuse to come. Folks in Haven rarely summoned him, preferring the services of a white man from Tombstone or Tucson, and when desperation forced their hand, received Dr. Emilio Sanchez coolly.

Going out to greet him, Maddie was conscious of her crumpled dress and tumbledown hair. “Dr. Sanchez,” she said. “Thank you for coming.”

He merely nodded, assessing the odd little house and the skinny chickens already pecking the sparse ground outside their coop as he started toward the open door.

Maddie was just turning to follow him when she saw Abigail Blackstone approaching purposefully from the direction of the schoolhouse. Miss Blackstone's tidy hair and neat sprigged muslin dress made an unsettling contrast to Maddie's general dishevelment, and it shamed her how glad she was that no one was here to make a comparison between the two.

“You're out early,” Maddie said, and tried to smile.

“You must be Maddie Chancelor,” Miss Blackstone said. Her eyes were kind, with a note of deep sadness in them, but they took Maddie's measure just the same.

Maddie nodded. “And you're Abigail Blackstone.”

“Yes,” Abigail said, and moved to stroke the doctor's burro, standing nearby.

“There is sickness here,” Maddie told the other woman. “It might be best to keep your distance.”

Abigail turned her head, regarded Maddie with one eyebrow raised and her hand resting lightly on the burro's shaggy neck. “Whatever it is,” she said quietly, “I've either had it already or nursed someone who did. I came to offer my help, if you'll take it.”

Maddie swallowed. She couldn't have said what she'd expected from this unknown woman, but it hadn't been this quiet, competent generosity of spirit. “I guess word got around pretty fast,” she said.

Abigail smiled, though her eyes were still pensive, even somber. “Your brother came knocking on my door as soon as it was light. He's worried that you'll take sick.”

Maddie felt a pinch of concern. She wasn't ready to think about the things Terran had said about Violet and her mother the night before, or the way he'd acted. Still, he was her only blood relation and just a boy, and he and Ben had been alone at the mercantile all night long, probably scared. She needed to see him, know that he was safe.

She nodded, more to confirm her own thoughts than Abigail's remark. “I'll wait to see what Dr. Sanchez says, then go on back to the store.” She wanted to ask about Sam O'Ballivan—oh, she had so
many
questions about Sam O'Ballivan—but she was too proud.

Abigail must have guessed her thoughts. “We don't have to be enemies, Maddie,” she said.

Maddie had been about to turn and lead the way into the cabin, but Abigail's words stopped her. “Enemies?” she echoed, but she knew all too well that the other woman was referring to Sam. Some things didn't have to be spoken out loud to be understood.

Miss Blackstone merely smiled. “He's a wonderful man. I can't blame you if you're taken with him.”

Maddie started to protest, stopped herself and tried again. “I'm not ‘taken' with Mr. O'Ballivan,” she said. She'd spoken truthfully. Why did the words sour like a lie on her tongue?

“I wish I believed you,” Abigail reflected with a small sigh. For the next few moments she regarded Maddie with thoughtful intensity. “But you don't even believe
yourself,
do you?”

“Nothing has happened between Sam and me,” Maddie said. At least,
that
was the truth. He'd never made any sort of overture, romantic or otherwise. It was the way she felt in his presence, or when she thought of him, especially late at night, that worried her.

“Some things,” Abigail observed, “happen on the inside, where no one can see.”

Maddie didn't respond, but the idea of Sam loving Abigail Blackstone or any other woman left a bruise on her spirit. From the first day she'd met him, she'd known he was just passing through, and so ignored the fact that her heart seemed to lean toward him, somehow. Now he'd installed Miss Blackstone in his room behind the schoolhouse, and that said all there was to say.

“Go look after your brother,” Abigail said. “I'll take over here and send word if there's any change.”

Maddie hesitated, glanced toward the shack and saw Violet watching from the doorway. The child looked so small, and so forlorn, standing there in the dress Sam had bought for her. Maddie approached, while Abigail held back.

“Who's that lady?” Violet whispered suspiciously.

“That's Miss Blackstone,” Maddie replied. “She's come to look after you and your mother for a while, so I can see to Terran and Ben and make sure things are all right at the store.”

A tremor moved visibly through Violet's stiff little body. “I don't know her,” she said.

“She's Mr. O'Ballivan's good friend,” Maddie answered. “And she knows about nursing.”

“You won't come back,” Violet accused. “Terran will make you stay at home.”

Maddie reached out, touched the child's uncombed hair. “I
promise
I'll come back,” she said. “As soon as I possibly can.”

Violet gnawed at her lower lip and her gaze strayed to Abigail as the other woman stepped up beside Maddie, who introduced the two, murmured a few reassuring words to Violet and turned to go.

Violet caught up with her in a few steps, clutched at her hand. “Miss Maddie!” she cried, tugging. “Miss
Maddie!
”

Maddie blinked back tears of exhaustion and sorrow. “Yes, Violet?”

“Thank you. Thank you for comin' to watch over Ma the way you did. Even if you don't come back like you promised, I'm obliged.”

Maddie smiled, bent and kissed the top of the little girl's head. “Try to rest, Violet,” she counseled softly. “It won't do if you wear yourself out and fall sick from it.”

Violet peered up into Maddie's carefully controlled face for a long moment, trying to read her. Then she nodded, let go of her painful grip on Maddie's hand and rushed back to the cabin.

Terran was in the kitchen, dropping an armload of wood into the box beside the stove when Maddie stepped wearily through the open back door. He regarded her stonily but said nothing.

“Where's Ben?” she asked to break the uncomfortable silence.

“He's lit out,” Terran replied. He wouldn't meet her eyes and tried to push past her to escape into the yard. “We got into it.”

Maddie laid a hand on his shoulder to stop him. He stiffened but didn't try to get free. “I have many things to say to you,” she said, “but I'm too tired to start, and I've got a full day's work ahead of me.” She paused, sighed. “What happened between you and Ben?”

“He said if he had a sister like you,” Terran said, flushing defiantly as he finally looked up to meet Maddie's gaze, “he'd treat her nice.”

Maddie waited.

“I said I
do
treat you nice, and he called me a liar. So I told him to get out and not ever come back.”

She sighed. “Go find him, please. He needs to be here with us right now, Terran.”

He glared up at her, recalcitrant to the bone. She had herself to thank for that, and no one else. In her desire to protect him, she'd indulged him too often. “What about breakfast?”

Maddie frowned. “It'll be ready and waiting.”

Terran stood still. “I won't tell him I'm sorry, because I ain't,” he said.

Maddie ruffled his hair. “‘Because
I'm not,
'” she corrected.

He swallowed, nodded once and bolted.

Maddie didn't move right away. She felt as though she'd somehow rushed ahead of herself, leaving the Perkinses' place, and had to catch up. When she did, she moved quickly, ladling hot water into a basin from the reservoir on the stove, fetching a flour-sack towel and a bar of soap and scrubbing her hands and face until they stung.

She put on a pot of coffee, then assembled the ingredients for hotcakes—Terran's favorite—made a batter and whipped it to a bubbly froth. By the time her brother returned, with a stoic Ben in tow, the table was set and the meal was waiting in the warming oven.

The three of them ate in silence.

When Terran had cleaned his plate, he carried it to the sink, which was, Maddie figured, as close to a voluntary apology as she was likely to get.

She sighed.

A loud knocking at the front of the store stirred her to action. She and Ben put their own dishes with Terran's, and then she smoothed her hair and passed resolutely through the curtain into the main part of the mercantile.

Oralee Pringle was peering through the display window, looking concerned.

Maddie hurried to open the door.

“We won't make us any money if you're going to lollygag half the morning,” Oralee said. She sounded impatient, but there was something that might have passed for kindness in her eyes.

“It's Sunday,” Maddie said reasonably.

Oralee smiled. “So it is. You'd think I'd remember, with Saturday bein' the biggest night of the week for business.”

Maddie didn't comment.

“I know you spent the night tending the Perkins woman, and you look all done-in,” Oralee said. “You ought to lie down awhile.”

Maddie must have looked confounded, because Oralee laughed.

“Lordy,” she said, “I think you're half again as stubborn as I am, and that's saying something. How's the Perkins woman faring this morning? Hittie, isn't it? And how's that poor little kid of hers?”

“They're in a desperate way,” Maddie said, conscious of Oralee's gaze as she reached for the broom, but unable to look at the other woman until she'd blinked a few times. She wondered if anyone else would ask about Violet and Hittie over the course of the day, and feared they wouldn't. Mostly, folks just pretended the Perkins family didn't exist.

“I'll send a couple of my girls over there with some vittles,” Oralee announced.

Maddie stopped sweeping.

“What're you starin' at me for?” Oralee demanded too loudly and too cheerfully. “Ain't you never heard of a whore with a heart of gold?”

“I will thank you to watch your language, Oralee Pringle,” Maddie heard herself say. But she was smiling.

“If we wait for them ‘good Christians' over to the church to do something, those folks'll starve. Too afraid of gettin' sick themselves, I reckon. And probably tellin' each other this is what comes of bein' a Perkins.”

“There are a lot of kind people in this town,” Maddie had to say. “They're just scared, that's all.”

Oralee huffed out a scoffish breath. “Might as well believe what suits you,” she allowed.

Just then two of Maddie's regular customers paused on the sidewalk out front, peering in through the display window. Seeing Oralee, they recoiled, fanned themselves industriously and rushed on by.

“Guess I'm not good for business, on Sunday or any other day,” Oralee remarked, and though the words were stoutly uttered, Maddie heard some sorrow in them. “Best I get back to the Rattlesnake, anyhow. I'll send somebody by with my grocery order tomorrow. No sense shoppin' in Tucson anymore, now that I've got a stake in your fortunes.”

Before Maddie could respond, Oralee opened the door and trundled out into the crisp morning sunlight.

 

“N
EVER MIND WHO
came in on that stage,” Sam said impatiently when Vierra put the same question to him for what must have been the hundredth time since they'd left the railroad car to saddle up and go after the Donaghers and the rest of the outlaw gang. They'd started right away, but it was hard, tracking at night, and now that the sun was up, Sam was beginning to wonder if they'd flat-out lost the trail.