Whispers on the Wind (3 page)

He glanced sideways at his
deputy, Rick Mc- Callum. Rick had ridden with Carter for years.
They were about the same size and temperament, but where Carter had
dark hair and eyes, Rick had blond hair and blue eyes. Carter had
to admit he liked Rick. He was a good one to put up with Carter’s
grouchiness. “How much longer ’til spring?”

“Hasn’t changed in the
last hour—still three months away,” Rick said in his lazy drawl. “I
think you’re getting old, Monroe.”

“Right about now, I’d
probably agree with you. My bones are starting to ache. I should
have taken another assignment.”

“Texas don’t sound bad,”
Rick suggested.

“A hell of a lot warmer,
too.”

Rick shifted in his saddle.
“Just remember, Hank needs us until he can get on his feet again.
’Sides, it’s your hometown.”

“I’d like to get my hands
on the bastard who shot Hank. But I’m damn glad the bullet wasn’t
fatal. At least it will be a chance to visit Ma again and get some
good home cooking.”

“That don’t sound bad at
all. How long since you been home?”

“Ma will tell you, too
long.” Carter chuckled. “It’s been about two years. Maybe
longer.”

They had just rounded a
bend when Rick hollered, “What’s that?”

Carter peered ahead of
them. Something black was protruding from the snow, and it didn’t
have fur. “Looks like a body,” he said. “And I don’t see a horse,
so it doesn’t look good.”

When they reached the snow
bank, they pulled their horses to a stop and Carter dismounted,
tossing the reins to Rick. Carter made his way over to the drift,
reached down, and grabbed a handful of wool. With one mighty jerk,
he hauled the body out of the snow.

“Is he dead?”

As Carter turned the body
around, the hat fell off and blond hair tumbled out across his
arms. “Try
she,”
he corrected. He removed his glove and felt for a pulse on
the side of her neck. “For the moment, she’s alive. But barely.”
Carter brushed the snow from her face then sat her up. He shook the
snow from her hair.

“Need some help?” Rick
asked.

“No. Doesn’t look like
there’s much to her.” Carter scooped the woman up in his arms,
adding, “She has one hell of a knot on her head. She was either
thrown or left for dead.”

“No doubt But the question
is, what is she doing way out here alone?”

“Interesting question,”
Carter said as he studied her face. Then he handed the girl to
Rick. “I guess we’ll have to wait until she wakes up to find out.”
“Hell, her lips are blue.” Rick cocked a brow as he frowned. “She
might not wake up.”

Once Carter mounted, he
reached for the girl. “I’m aware of that” After several tries, he
managed to unbutton her frozen coat Then he yanked it off her and
handed it to Rick. “Here, you take that frozen coat, and I’ll take
the girl.”

“Some trade,” Rick
grumbled as he folded the stiff wool and tied it on the back of his
horse.

Carter tucked the girl
under his heavy coat, pulling her next to his body. Then he wrapped
the fur back around them. A shiver shuddered through his body.
Damn, the woman was cold. She was small, too, he
thought.

His mind burned with the
memory of another woman. She’d been small, too. He let out a long,
exhausted sigh. This one was going to need luck on her side if she
was going to survive.

They moved on, neither man
choosing to talk. It had been a long three days.

As they rode, the wind and
snow increased until visibility was almost impossible. They trudged
on until they could finally see the light of the small town of
Appleton.

Carter felt like a
wood-burning stove by the time they came to a stop in front of the
hotel. The girl’s body pressed next to him made his body
burn.

Rick dismounted first “I
was beginning to think my butt had grown attached to that thing.”
He pointed toward the saddle. “How is the girl?”

Thawed.”

Rick chuckled. “I’ll take
the horses to the stables. You get the rooms.” He took Carter’s
reins, then the girl.

Carted dismounted before
taking the girl back. He shifted her in his arms as he mounted the
steps of the two-story, brown Stratford Hotel. For someone so
little, the girl was becoming heavier by the moment Luckily,
someone was coming out and held the door open for him to
enter.

“Obliged.” Carter nodded.
When he reached the front desk, he said firmly, “I need two rooms
and a doctor.”

The clerk nodded. Funny, he
didn’t even blink an eye at the bundle Carter carried as he said,
“Sign here.”

Maybe people dragged
unconscious women into the hotel all the time.

“My arms are a little
occupied at the moment”

“That’s your problem,
mister.” The clerk hesitated, and Carter’s patience
snapped.

He leaned forward and said
in a deadly calm voice, “The name is Carter Monroe, U.S. Marshal.
I’m tired. And I’m hungry. If you don’t get the lead out, I’m going
to mop up this floor with you.”

The clerk’s eyes grew round
as saucers. “Y—yes sir. Rooms ten and eleven are at the top of the
stairs. And I’ll send somebody for Doc Elliot right
away.”

“That’s more like it”
Carter took the keys, but kept his smile in check. Now why didn’t
he get that kind of service when he’d first walked in? “My deputy
will be here as soon as he stables the horses. Send him up to room
ten.”

Carter started for the
stairs. His arms ached from the weight of the woman who hadn’t
weighed that much when he’d first picked her up. Now he couldn’t
wait to put his burden down and get out of his damn heavy
coat

Once in the room, he placed
the girl on the bed and shrugged out of the wet fur, then tossed
the long coat over a heavy chair in the corner to dry. He glanced
around the room and decided it wasn’t bad.

It was clean. There was a
small fire in the fireplace which was the first thing that needed
adjustment He tossed several logs onto the grate and stirred the
coals until the flames were jumping over the logs.

“That’s more like it” he
said as he stood and wiped his hands. The heat felt good on his
face. “We’ll be warm in a minute,” Carter told the unconscious
girl. The color had returned to her face, but she had one hell of a
knot on her forehead and dark circles under her eyes. He really
couldn’t say she was pretty in her abused state. Her blond hair was
tangled and dirty. He reached down and picked up a strand of hair,
noticing there was dried blood on the end.

Carter felt the hairs on
the back on his neck stand on end. Hmm. He rubbed his chin. The
blood hadn’t come from the knot on her head, so where had it come
from? Maybe it was some sixth sense he had developed over the years
as a lawman that warned him something was wrong with this woman.
He’d bet a month’s pay she was running from something.

The big question was,
what?

One thing was certain: he
couldn’t get any answers until she woke up. He shrugged. Well,
there wasn’t anything else he could do for the moment, so he washed
up and changed into clean duds while he waited for the
doctor.

Twenty minutes later, Doc
Elliot arrived. He shrugged out of his coat and grumbled, “Ain’t
fit for man or beast out there. Surprised you made it, though.” The
doctor turned and looked at Carter over his spectacles. “You don’t
look sick.”

Carter pointed toward the
bed. “It’s the girl.” “Your wife?”

“Nope.”

“Hmm,” the doctor said as
he placed his bag beside the bed. “Help me get the dress off her.”
Together they removed the faded gray dress, and Carter placed it on
the other side of the chair. He noticed her drawers were not fancy
like most women’s, so she hadn’t come from wealth.

The doctor began to examine
her. He grunted and clicked his tongue, but no intelligent words
came out of the man’s mouth.

“Do you know her?” Carter
asked.

“Me?” Elliot gave him a
quizzical look. “I thought she was with you.”

“Nope. I found her upside
down in a snow bank. Figured she could be a runaway or something
and thought maybe she was from Appleton.”

“Don’t think she’s from
here. I know most folks around here, and I haven’t seen her
before,” Doc

Elliot said as he listened
to her chest “Her heart is strong and her lungs are clear, so
that’s a good sign. I’m a bit surprised she doesn’t have
consumption from being out in the cold.”

“I wonder where she’s
from,” Carter said. “Maybe the mountain. There are lots of small
mining towns up there, but I’ve never heard of a woman living on
the mountain. Life’s too hard,” the doc said, and then he looked at
her hands

“
However, appears she has done some hard work by these hands.
But no woman could hold up under mining, so I’d rule that thought
out”

Someone knocked on the
door.

“Come in,” Carter
called.

Rick entered and nodded
toward the doctor. “Horses are taken care of, and I’ve ordered us
some grub. It will be ready shortly.”

Carter made the
introductions before asking the doctor, “What do you think about
the girl?”

Doc Elliot straightened and
stretched the kinks out of his back. “She has a concussion”—he
paused—“but other than that she appears healthy.”

“What can we do for
her?”

“Not a thing,” Doc Elliot
said as he placed his instruments back in his black beg. “She may
wake up tomorrow or it may take several days.” He picked up his bag
and turned toward Carter. “Seems the body is a strange instrument
She might not be able to tell you anything when she comes to. Her
memory could be gone or she could be completely normal and then all
your worries will be over. If anything changes tonight, call for
me.”

“I’ll do that Thanks,
Doc,” Carter said.

After the door shut Rick
pushed away from the wall. “So what are we going to do with
her?”

Carter’s expression was
tight with strain. “Damned if I know,” he said with a sigh. “Let’s
get something to eat. I’ve suddenly developed a rip-roaring
headache.”

Rick chuckled. “Yep, and
there it lies in bed.”

Chapter Two

Carter wasn’t sure he’d
enjoyed dinner as his thoughts reluctantly kept returning to the
unconscious woman upstairs, but at least his stomach had quit
growling. And they were inside, out of the miserable snow. Spring
couldn’t come soon enough for him.

Rick had grumbled all
through
dinn
er
about how sorry his company was,
and he was probably right. Carter had been quiet throughout the
meal. Usually they’d discuss the next day, but tonight Rick had
talked and Carter had barely managed to grunt his replies. He’d
never admit to his sidekick that his mind was upstairs because then
Rick would never let him alone about the girl.

They had left the table and
were headed for the stairs when Rick asked him, “You want to bunk
with me?”

“No. I’d better keep an
eye out for our pris—I mean the girl, in case she wakes up. Don’t
want her to bolt before I have some answers,” Carter said with a
grin. “If I get tired, I’ll sleep on top of the blanket, so she
doesn’t wake up crying rape.”

“Yep.” Rick chuckled. “I’d
hate to have to arrest you.”

Carter turned the doorknob
and entered the room while Rick stood back leaning against the
doorjamb.

Carter arched his brow.
“Arrest me? That will be the day.”

“You can’t possibly care
one thing about that little filly.”

“Of course, I don’t,”
Carter snapped, then he jerked his arm toward the girl. “Look at
her. She looks like something the cats dragged in, but she’s also
very young and, at the moment, helpless. I know I’ve been accused
of being a coldhearted SOB, but I do have compassion once in a
while.”

Rick gave him a half smile.
“I’ll guess somehow I missed that side of your sterling
personality. I bet the outlaws you’ve hauled in would have a
different opinion.”

“A criminal doesn’t
deserve compassion,” Carter said as he sat down on one of the
chairs by the fireplace to remove his boots. “The ones I’ve met are
guilty until proven innocent.”

“That’s what I like about
you ... everything is either black or white. There is no
in-between.”

“It’s worked well for me
in the past.” Carter grunted as he jerked off his left boot “So I
see no reason to change.”

Rick folded his arms across
his chest. “I hate to bring up the subject, but what are you going
to do with her”—he nodded toward the bed—“when we get ready to
leave?”

Carter stared at the woman
for a long moment. “If she’s awake, we’ll leave her in the good
hands of the sheriff. If she isn’t”—he paused, rubbing his
chin—“I’m taking her with me.”