Dead Man's Ranch Page 11

  “The attorney told me of you.”

  Brian had walked up behind her while she was daydreaming. She stiffened, and returned to the house.

  He followed her and spoke again once they were back in the kitchen. “He said you were to be taken care of, per custom, as something akin to a common-law spouse of my father. I will see to it. So long as you don’t expect anything more in the way of remuneration after that. To that end, I had him draw up certain documents that remove you legally from this place and any potential claim, however paltry, someone such as yourself may have on such a property. I have been led to believe that the holdings here are substantial, nearly three thousand acres. Though admittedly it seems absurd to establish ownership on such a vast tract of land, the resale value will no doubt change my mind.”

  “I don’t doubt that, mister.” The voice came from the open door behind Brian Middleton.

  Middleton spun and saw a man of average height leaning in the doorframe, backlit by the setting sun.

  Esperanza wanted to smile, wanted to run to her son and tell him who this stranger was, wanted this all to be so much different than it was. Instead she stood still. And she watched.

  “So, you are the idiot who left Silver Haskell’s horse saddled out front—that old mare looks all done in. What have you done to her?” The speaker stepped away from the door and into the room.

  “It’s you! The drunken ruffian who attacked me the other night in town.”

  “Really? I don’t remember attacking much of anything.”

  “Except a bottle….” Esperanza surprised even herself with her spoken criticism of her son.

  Brandon’s soft chuckle surprised her. There was a time that he would have gritted his teeth, scowled, and run from the place. He must be growing up some. Or he’s just tired and wants me to cook for him. And I will, she thought.

  The big stranger flopped his hat on the corner of the table and turned to face the young man, his big, soft hands contracting into fists the size of a child’s head. Brandon didn’t move. He let his gaze trail upward from the man’s flexing hands, across the broad chest, and on up to the face. As he did so his smile gave way to slow confusion, then shock. Esperanza knew then what her son was discovering. But instead of the rage that she expected of him, he stood up straight, stepped out of the shadowed doorway and into the room, and slowly removed his own hat. He filled his chest with air and stared at the big man before him. “So, you are him, eh?”

  Esperanza watched Brian’s face as it took in the knot of wild red hair, darker than his own, but undeniably similar. His face totted up the same emotions as Brandon’s. “Who are you, boy?”

  “You are in my house. I will ask the questions and you will provide the answers.” Brandon’s top lip curved into a menacing snarl.

  Esperanza rushed between them, putting out a hand toward each. “Brandon,” she said, looking at her son. “Forgive me for not introducing you. Brian Middleton, meet Brandon.”

  “Brandon? Brandon…what?” The newcomer looked straight into the eyes of the young man. “Surely you have a surname, boy.” Brian’s tilted head said it all—he knew what the answer would be.

  “That would be MacMawe.”

  They stood facing each other for a full minute, Esperanza between them, her hands slowly lowering. Finally Brian half turned and plucked his battered hat from the table and said, “So, the common-law wife birthed a bastard.”

  Brandon gently pushed his mother aside with his left hand even while the right swung wide and caught Middleton’s rangy jaw full-on. The big man grunted as if clubbed with a chair leg and pitched backward. As he landed, the stout old table creaked, something underneath cracked like a gunshot in the small room, and it slid hard three feet across the floor. Atop it, Brian slid with the table, then rolled to the edge, and off. He tried to rise once, then sagged, facedown, on the scrubbed pine floor.

  “Brandon, what have you done?” Esperanza whispered, her hands covering her mouth.

  “No one will talk about you that way, Ma. Not as long as I’m able to raise a fist.”

  She bent to the unconscious man’s side. “It’s not fists that need raising, but some brains. Your father would not approve of this, and you know it.”

  “My father is dead. And this…dandy…is the person who he lived for all those years? Bah!” He spun and left the house. Soon she heard his horse thundering away as she had so many times since his father died. To town and to the bottle, she thought. And to an early grave.

  Esperanza looked with tired eyes at the stranger. She knew she would have to ask to see his documents, would have to surrender to the fact that he was now the heir to his father’s fortune—in land if not in any other way—but right now all she wanted was to go to sleep. It had been a month since Rory had died, and it seemed to her that she hadn’t slept, really slept, in several months. But now she was tired, well and truly tired. She felt as if she would sign anything just to be rid of this person she once knew.

  Chapter 22

  On his way out of Turnbull, Squirly had stopped at the sheriff’s office. Tucker had been off for the morning, roofing his outhouse, something he’d promised Mrs. Tucker he would get to for months. She’d grown tired of the little structure’s top being exposed to the elements. Deputy Sweazy had smiled telling Squirly this.

  Of all the folks in town, Sweazy was about the only one the old drunk knew who would still treat Squirly as though he were a fellow man and not a foolish child or a lesser creature. That was perhaps why he had never hit up the younger man for the price of a drink.

  “Well,” Squirly said, wishing he hadn’t stopped. “I’d imagine an outhouse without a roof could get a mite breezy.”

  Sweazy had allowed as how that could well be a reason for so many marriages ending in an angry shooting match.

  “Do they really?” Despite his hurry, Squirly shuddered. “Guess I won’t be marryin’ any time soon, then. That sounds awful.”

  “So, what can I do for you, Mr. Ross?” Sweazy leaned forward in the desk chair, his brows knotted in concentration.

  Squirly cleared his throat. “I would like to direct Sheriff Tucker’s attention to a certain stranger who come into town lately, yesterday I’m thinking, and I think he’s a murderer.”

  Sweazy stood up. “You mean the MacMawe boy who calls himself Middleton?”

  “What? No, no, I’m talking about that odd foreigner fella. Ain’t a Mex, ain’t anything I know. But his tone seemed to change when I told him about my friend, Mitchell Farthing, who’s coming into Turnbull any day now from up north.”

  “Why should that concern him? Lots of folks come to Turnbull. Well, not all that many, but it’s been known to happen.” Deputy Sweazy looked almost embarrassed at admitting that Turnbull was less than a destination at present.

  “Well, now, I know all that. But my situation is complicated. Just tell Sheriff Tucker what I said. I know how he feels about me, so lie if you have to, but have him keep a sharp eye on that foreign fellow. There’s something fishy with that one, mark my words.”

  “Where are you headed, Mr. Ross?”

  “Why, I thought that would be plain, Deputy. I’m headed north to find my friend. If he has fallen on misfortune, I aim to gun down that foreign fellow. Savvy?”

  “Just because your friend is late getting to town doesn’t mean something bad has happened to him.”

  Squirly opened the door and looked back at the deputy. “Now, you may be right. Then again, you may just be inexperienced in the ways of the world. I, for one, have a ton of living under my belt. But the truth will all come out in the wash. Well, someone’s wash anyway. I’ll keep myself calm until I find out I need to do otherwise. Good day to you, Deputy Sweazy.”

  Chapter 23

  It took all of Esperanza’s strength to drag Brian’s big, limp body up to a sitting position, propped against a table leg. He moaned but didn’t come around right away. She felt bad for him, but her anger at what he said, at all the turmoil and
pain and grief he represented to her and her son forced her work-hardened hands into fists and her mouth into a grim line. From the drawer of a sideboard, she pulled out a sheet of writing paper, tore it evenly in half, and in a precise hand wrote a brief note. She replaced the unused half sheet and the quill and ink bottle to their places in the drawer. From a larger drawer, deep in the back, she slid out a heavy, leather-covered family Bible. The corners were cracked, and the gilt edging glowed dull.

  For a moment she stood, her calloused hand resting on the cover. Then she slipped the note under the front cover, half sticking out the top. She carried the Bible to the unconscious young man and set it on his lap. She stood, looked around the room, and her gaze landed on the battered bowler upside down on the floor in the corner. She retrieved it and set it atop the Bible. Then she went outside to feed her chickens.

  As she ushered the last of her buff hens into their night coop, she heard the uneven rattle of horse’s hooves and she knew that Brian Middleton was leaving the dooryard. It seemed to her as if her entire life was spent watching people leave, and she wondered what she did to deserve this cruelty. Maybe the next life would be filled with a dozen happy children who loved being with her. She would have liked to have more children. Perhaps there might still be grandchildren in her future. Then she thought of Brandon and knew that he was unlikely to offer her anything but grief in the future. If he even had much of a future.

  Minutes before, Brian Middleton had come to on the floor of the crude little home, sitting upright against the table leg. He looked about himself and felt oddly comfortable, given his situation. For the few moments it took for his fuzzy head to clear, he thought he was home. Something more than a feeling but less than a memory of happiness and warmth swaddled him, and then it was gone. Again he took in the room, but now it seemed shabby and small, and in no way compared favorably with the many and varied rooms of his grandfather’s well-appointed town house, or the family’s summer estate at the shore in Newport.

  He rubbed his face with a trembling hand and winced at the lumped jaw, swollen more than ever now that he’d been hit there twice—and by the same ruffian. A brute who, if the little Mexican woman’s intimations were to be trusted, was his half brother. He couldn’t deny the youth’s red hair, doubly shocking to see it perched on the dark complexion of someone of Mexican descent. His hand dropped to his lap, cratering his abused hat. Beneath it sat a massive book with a note poking from it.

  He slid out the note, the indigo script precise and orderly on unlined paper. As he read, his face settled once again into the barely tolerant, disappointed lines he’d worn since crossing the Mississippi River weeks before. He pushed to one knee, but had to steady himself on the edge of the table as a wave of dizziness washed over him, leaving him feeling cold prickliness from head to foot. Sweat broke over him, and his teeth chattered for a moment. Before long, the chill feeling ebbed.

  Brian Middleton stood, plunked his hat on his head, and carrying the big Bible with him, stuffed it inside one of his carpetbags, then mounted the defeated horse and rode back in the direction from which he’d come but a short time before. He did not see the woman as he left. Nor did he want to, especially given the brutal way he’d been treated in her home. Her home…. We’ll see about that, he thought as he dug his heels into the flanks of the old, tired mare.

  Chapter 24

  After nearly an hour in the saddle, Brian reined up, knowing he would not make town that night. Nor, did he think, would the horse. And then the angry young man’s words came back to him. Idiot, he’d called him, for leaving the horse saddled. He’d said she looked all done in. He looked at the horse beneath him and knew the boy was correct.

  Why did he not think of the animal’s welfare before now? He’d been in such a rush to get to his father’s ranch and complete the transaction that he’d neglected to attend to the animal’s most basic needs—like rest. He dismounted and with a tentative hand patted the horse’s shoulder. The animal looked back at him and he swore there was the stony glint of anger in her eye, though she seemed too tired to do anything about it.

  It took him ten minutes to figure out how to loosen the cinch, then drag off the saddle. He tried to recall Junior’s lesson from the night before, but everything seemed so muddy in his head. Finally the saddle just slipped off the horse’s back. The bit and bridle looked equally as painful and the horse seemed so worn out that he doubted there was any need to tie her.

  Not that there was much to tie her to. The spot he’d chosen was bereft of anything more substantial than rocks and scrubby bushes no taller than waist high, it seemed, for as far as he could see in the afternoon’s softening light. He nodded in satisfaction as he slipped off the bridle. The horse walked away a few steps, then dropped to her knees and stretched out prone on her side. Within seconds her long legs were kicking in the air and she writhed in the dust as if being strangled.

  And though he recalled, once again, Junior’s words of assurance from the previous evening, he was certain that this time he’d lose the horse. Something was wrong; he just knew it. “Good heavens, what do I do now? She’ll die because of my ignorance. She’s taken a fit and I’m miles from anywhere and I should have known better.”

  Even as he stood there, watching in shock as the horse twisted and rolled, hooves flailing in the air, and grunts coming from her mouth, the dusty brown horse rose and shook herself, then walked a few yards, stopped, and nosed a sparse clump of spiky green grasses. Brian finally exhaled.

  He set to making a camp, and as he unpacked his satchel he wondered about this trip, the people he’d met so far, the coffeepot belonging to that fellow Junior—would he even see him again? Not that he cared, but he hated the idea of being beholden to the man. He’d leave it for him in town, with a note. The boy had been kind, to an extent, though he did leave before Brian awoke, and after saying the night before that he would gladly take Brian to the Dancing M the following day. “A Western promise,” he muttered, shaking out his wool blanket. “Full of holes.”

  Within twenty minutes, he’d conjured a successful fire, and as he fed the tiny, dancing flames he thought of the sister of the coffeepot’s owner. Had Junior said her name? If he had, Brian had forgotten it. But not her face. She was a striking young lady, poised and bold in what few words he heard her speak. Back in Providence she would have been called impertinent, but out here he supposed that word was seldom used. In fact, he suspected her boldness would be highly regarded in this rough place. Then there was the ranch itself—a far cry from what he’d been led to believe from the attorney.

  He supposed the value of the place was in the land—that much acreage was bound to be worth a substantial sum. He would liquidate it as handily as possible and invest the money, as his grandfather had suggested, in sureties. Though not in what his grandfather would choose for him, but rather in what he would choose for himself. It was high time he stood up to the old curmudgeon. He’d taken a first step by embarking on this trip without his approval, and despite the horrible experiences thus far, something told Brian that this trip was just the thing he’d needed to do for quite some time now.

  At least he’d begun to feel that way until he met that woman at the ranch—Esperanza. Meeting her, going to that humble, tidy house, felt right in so many ways, yet also made him regret the entire trip. It was as if by walking in there he somehow willingly played into his dead father’s plans, and that didn’t feel good in the least. He was tired of being manipulated by everyone in his life, from his grandfather to his club friends, all the way down to the punch-throwing half brother, Brandon.

  Yes, he thought, as he poked the paltry fire, perhaps I should have taken Grandfather’s advice and let Atchison take care of things. He would have called me in within a few weeks to sign over the deed, hand me a banknote for the sale amount, and I would never have been the wiser. Then why did I come out here? He blew softly at the base of the flames. They surged higher, licking the dry, brown twigs, and he felt a smal
l twinge of satisfaction.

  A horse’s low snort made him look up. Shadowed in the dusk, a horse and rider stood not twelve feet from him. A voice cracked the space between them: “Hello there…brother.”

  So, it was the young fighter. “Don’t call me that.” Brian stood. “And as far as I’m concerned, we share a hair color, nothing more.” He pointed a long, meaty finger at the young man. “And I shan’t be convinced otherwise. And what’s more, I’ll not be goaded into violence. That may be your way, the very way of the West.” He thumbed his chest. “But that is not my way. Not by a long shot.”

  Brandon shrugged, then slipped from his horse. “Suits me just fine.”

  Brian stood half turned toward his visitor, his hands curled into fists at his sides.

  Brandon laughed. “You think I’m going to take another swing at you? Two is my limit. But I will say that for such a large man you are small on taking a punch.”

  Brian stared at him. He had made up his mind that he would not be struck again by this little rogue.

  “Relax, Middleton. You seem tense. I wonder why that could be.”

  “Perhaps because I’ve been victimized and savaged ever since I set foot in this strange land.”

  The younger man looked shocked. He loosened the cinch on his saddle and said, “Now you know how I feel.”

  “What does that mean?”

  But the young man ignored the question. “Besides, you shouldn’t feel out of place, or taken advantage of here. After all”—he raised his hands up as if testing for rain, then let them drop to his sides—“we are on your land.”

  Brian narrowed his eyes at the lad.

  Brandon laughed and said, “It’s true. Everything this side of the river, for days, weeks, months, years…in all these directions”—he laughed and arced an arm out into the growing dark—“is the Dancing M.”