Calder Born, Calder Bred

by Janet Dailey

  The only signs of life in the town were a couple of pickups parked in front of Sally’s. The grizzled driver pulled the truck off the two-lane and braked it to a groaning stop. Ty finally roused himself and reached for the door handle.

  “Thanks.” He threw the man a quick smile and swung out of the cab. The old pickup truck vibrated like a jumping bean as the motor idled.

  “You a Calder?” The land-worn man gave Ty a narrow, steely-eyed look.

  Ty pushed the door shut and said through the open window, “Yep.”

  The old man nodded satisfaction at the accuracy of his guess. “Had the look of one.” His sun-browned and age-spotted hand moved to the gearshift, an indication the conversation was at an end and he was ready to move on as soon as Ty got his case out of the back.

  His bag sat in the battered rear bed of the truck, amongst loose straw, empty gasoline cans, and a dirty collection of spare parts. Ty hefted it over the side panel and stepped back, lifting a hand in salute to the driver.

  The long afternoon shadow cast by the truck bounced away while Ty headed for the parked vehicles in front of Sally’s. A running wind kicked up dust swirls and chased them across the bare ground ahead of him.

  There had been two ways for him to reach the Triple C. He could have arranged to be dropped off at the east gate of the ranch, but if no one happened by to give him a ride, it would have meant a long walk of roughly thirty-five miles back to The Homestead. So he’d opted for Blue Moon. Sooner or later, someone from the ranch would come by the local watering hole and he’d be able to catch a ride back.

  But his luck had run better than that. One of the pickups outside the cafe-bar belonged to the ranch. Ty threw his suitcase in the back of it and climbed the steps to the entrance of Sally’s Place. The door opened before he reached it. Ty stiffened in place when he heard a throaty laugh he instantly recognized as his father’s.

  “See ya later, Sally.” His father swung into view, emerging from the dark shadows of the interior to cross the threshold and step outside. He came up short when he saw Ty, surprise shooting across his face. “How’d you get here?”

  “I hitched a ride from Miles City and figured I’d be able to cadge a lift to the ranch from here.” Ty wondered what kind of excuse his father had made to stop by Sally’s. He’d heard that laugh and the warmth in his father’s voice. It was plain that he was still involved with the woman.

  His father moved forward, frowning. “Graduation is next week.”

  “I know.” Ty swung around to descend the steps and drink in the untainted air. Another set of footsteps followed him. “I took the last of my exams yesterday. There didn’t seem to be any point to hang around for a ceremony. They’ll mail my diploma.”

  He’d tolerated the sympathy and the sad looks that told him everybody’d known all along his engagement to Tara wouldn’t last, until he couldn’t stand any more. The diploma was merely a document to please his mother and prove he’d achieved the objective he’d set out four years ago to attain. Pride had been his main reason for finishing out the last term, a pride that wouldn’t allow him to crawl away and lick his wounds after Tara had broken their engagement.

  It wasn’t what Ty said but the things he didn’t say, and the flatness in his voice and eyes and the lack of any reference to Tara, that clued Chase in to the reason Ty had arrived unannounced. He didn’t press for a more complete explanation as he climbed behind the wheel of the pickup and Ty settled into the passenger seat. It would all come out in its own good time.

  Silence dominated the long drive to the Triple C, and Chase made no attempt to break it. They were nearly to the headquarters, the peaked roof of The Homestead thrusting its chimneys into the blue horizon, when Ty shifted his position, signaling an intention to speak.

  “The engagement’s off.” Nothing more than that, and Chase didn’t pry into the reasons, regarding them as none of his business.

  “I guessed as much,” he admitted and sliced a side look to his son. “I’ve never met a man who didn’t get his fingers burnt or make a fool of himself over a woman at least once in his life. Wisdom only comes with experience.”

  “I suppose.” Ty turned his head to look out the window. There was no consolation in knowing he wasn’t the first or the last.

  The doors to The Homestead burst open as the pickup stopped in front of it, and Cathleen came racing out, ropes of long black curls bouncing around her shoulders. She shrieked with joy when she saw Ty step out of the pickup and hurled herself off the steps into his arms.

  “Hey, you’re getting heavy, Cat.” He smiled into her wide green eyes, beguilingly outlined with sooty lashes. She was remarkably beautiful for a girl who had just turned seven years old.

  “Nobody told me you were coming home today.” She pouted for an instant, then laughed and hugged his neck.

  “They didn’t?” Ty shifted her in his arms to smooth out the skirt of her ruffled white pinafore. “And I thought you were wearing this pretty dress just for me.”

  “I put it on for my Uncle Culley, but I would have worn it for you,” she assured him quickly.

  “Culley.” Ty shot a look at his father, seeking an explanation, as he set his sister down.

  “Yes,” came the confirmation. “He’s been released from the hospital. Maggie’s bringing him home this afternoon.”

  “He’s been sick,” Cathleen informed Ty with an adultlike air and reached to take his hand and lead him up the steps to the house. “But he’s better now. ’Course, Mommy said he still has to rest a lot.”

  “When did this come about?” Ty eyed his father, trying to discern his reaction. He was well aware of the bad blood that had been between his father and uncle, and seriously doubted that his father was pleased by O’Rourke’s release from the mental institution.

  “It’s been discussed frequently these last few months, but the doctor notified your mother of his intention shortly after you phoned last week. We had planned to tell you when we flew down for your graduation.” It was a statement of fact with no opinion offered, and none was visible as Chase Calder opened the front door and the three of them trooped into the house.

  “I’ve never seen Uncle Culley before. Have you?” Cath-leen’s patent-leather shoes made tapping sounds on the hardwood floor as she skipped along beside her older brother.

  “Yes.” But his memory was of a wild-eyed, paranoid man, trembling on the brink of madness. It was hardly an image he wanted to relate to his little sister.

  “What was he like?”

  “It was a long time ago, Cat. He’s probably changed a lot since the last time I saw him.”

  Her look became thoughtfully troubled. “Do you think he’ll like me?” Cathleen Calder was the darling of the Triple C, adored by everyone. With the sharpness of a child’s perception, she had sensed the undercurrents surrounding her uncle’s imminent arrival and guessed there was something about her uncle that made him different. Not having love and approval was the worst thing she could imagine.

  Her question wasn’t one Ty wanted to answer, because he knew how much Culley O’Rourke had hated anyone attached to the Calders in the past. But it wasn’t something his little sister needed to know, and she wouldn’t understand even if he attempted to explain.

  So he merely laughed aside her question and playfully tapped the end of her button nose. “I’ll bet he won’t like you as much as I do.” Cathleen beamed, finding reassurance in his avowal of affection.

  “Nanna Ruth!” Cathleen spied the elderly woman as she entered the living room from the kitchen hallway, and let go of Ty’s hand to run to meet her. “Look who’s here!”

  “Ty. My gracious.” She rested a trembling hand below her throat, her voice weak with surprise. “I didn’t know you were expected.”

  “I wasn’t. I thought I’d surprise everybody.” It was to become his standard explanation.

  “You certainly surprised me,” Ruth Haskell declared, then bit her lower lip. “We’ve been so busy helpi
ng Maggie get things ready for her brother that Audra hasn’t had time to air your room or have clean linen put on the bed.” Audra Cummings was the wife of one of the cowboys employed by the Triple C. She did most of the heavy cleaning at The Homestead.

  “Since it’s my fault for not letting anyone know I decided to skip the graduation exercises and come home early, I’ll take care of it,” Ty volunteered.

  “You’re going to skip the graduation ceremony?” Her brow became furrowed with lines of concern and regret. “Your mother has been looking forward to seeing you in your cap and gown.”

  “She’ll have to be satisfied with the diploma.” He smiled to lessen the sting of his disregard for his mother’s wishes.

  “Did you bring your girl?” Ruth looked at him expectantly. “Or will she be coming later?”

  “No.” Ty sobered, his expression hardening. “She won’t be coming.”

  “Oh.” Ruth made a small sound as she realized her query had been a mistake. In her lifetime, she’d seen many such reactions—the closed-in look of a man whose feelings had been deeply bruised.

  The thick walls of the house muted the slam of a car door that was closely followed by the sound of a second one. “That must be Mommy with Uncle Culley!” Cathleen was about to run to meet them, but Ty caught her by the shoulders.

  “Let’s wait for them here,” he said and caught the glimmer of approval in his father’s glance before he turned to face the entrance.

  The man who walked through the door with his mother seemed a shy shadow of the man Ty remembered. His shoulders appeared permanently bowed in a protective hunch, and the lank black hair that had covered his head was now shot full of gray. He wasn’t as thin as Ty’s image of him, but the added weight gave him a soft, puffy look—or maybe it was the paleness of his white skin, so long shut away from sunlight. The nervousness, the hair-trigger energy that always seemed poised on the edge of violence, was gone. There was something subdued about the way he allowed himself to be guided into the living room.

  A look of surprise flashed across his mother’s face when she saw him standing behind Cathleen, but she didn’t question his unexpected presence. That would come later. At the moment, her chief concern was to smooth the path for her brother’s return to the world. There was tension on both sides.

  “Hello, Culley.” His father spoke first, neither offering false words of welcome nor offering to shake hands.

  “Hello.” His head bobbed in an abrupt acknowledgment.

  Ty noticed how blank O’Rourke’s eyes were, as if he were trying to shut out the identity of the man he greeted. His mother didn’t press for more conversation than that, instead directing her brother’s attention to him.

  “This is Ty,” she said in a bright and reassuring tone. “He’s grown so much since the last time you saw him that you probably don’t recognize him.”

  “He’s taller, older—but I recognize him.” His voice was clear and steady, hesitating only in its choice of words. While those shuttered eyes picked out the things he remembered about Ty, Ty was reminded of the old, grizzled man in the pickup truck who had remarked that Ty had the look of a Calder. “Hello, Ty.”

  “Hello, Culley,” he returned and kept both hands on his sister’s shoulders, like his father not offering to shake.

  Cathleen twisted her head around to look up at him and hiss a correction. “You’re supposed to call him Uncle Culley.”

  A dim sparkle appeared in the flat eyes as they fell to the little girl. O’Rourke crouched down, letting one knee touch the floor.

  “You must be Cathleen.” There was a softening that came to his mouth, almost a smile.

  “Hello, Uncle Culley.” Cathleen did not feel bound by the reticence of her father or brother. “I’m glad you’re feeling better. Mommy said you were sick for a long time. It isn’t fun being sick.”

  “No, it isn’t.” The innocent reference to his prolonged illness did not seem to bother him. Uncertainly, O’Rourke reached out and gently curled a hand under her fingers, being very careful, as if she were made of fragile bone china. There was something wondering about the gesture, hinting that it might have been a long time since he had touched another human, especially a child. “You are very pretty.”

  “Do you like my dress?” Cathleen took her hand away to hold out both sides of her green underskirt to show him. “I wore it for you. I would have worn it for Ty, but I didn’t know he was coming home today. We got cookies. Would you like some?”

  “I think that’s a good idea, Cathleen.” Maggie smiled, silently pleased at how much her daughter had achieved with her chatter. Her brother had been so ill at ease, watching everything he said so carefully. Culley had been used to his own company so long he had never learned how to relate. “Why don’t we all sit down?” Maggie suggested, then said to Ruth, “Would you have Audra bring us some coffee and a plate of cookies?”

  Over coffee, O’Rourke gradually started to loosen up, and Ty observed the slow emergence of the gray-haired man, old yet only in his early forties. Some of his initial impressions remained, but some altered.

  “Wait until you see the room Mommy and I fixed for you,” Cathleen declared. “Want me to show it to you?”

  “You can take him upstairs a little later,” Maggie inserted.

  “It’s nice,” she promised. “You have your own radio, and a big chair, magazines, and everything. And it will be your room forever and ever.”

  Something flickered across his pale face, and he turned to look at Maggie, who sat on the sofa beside him. “Is something wrong, Culley?” she asked.

  “Is this what you meant when you said you were taking me home?” he asked.

  “Yes.” She was puzzled by his question. “As Cathleen said, we have a room all fixed up for you—your own private place where you can be by yourself if you want or—”

  “I don’t think it’s a good idea for me to stay here, Maggie.” He swung a level glance at Chase. “You understand what I’m saying, don’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Culley, I want this to become your home, too,” Maggie insisted and appealed to her husband to support her. “Chase and I talked it over and he agreed that you could stay here with us.”

  “I. . . appreciate that,” Culley nodded, “but—it wouldn’t work.”

  “Where else can you go?”

  “Where I thought you were taking me—home to Shamrock,” he said simply.

  “But no one’s lived in that old house for years,” she protested. “There isn’t any heat or lights . . . there hasn’t been for seven years. You can’t go there.”

  “I can fix it up—at least one room of it. Maggie, that’s where I belong. I don’t belong here.” He looked around the big mansion-sized house. “There’s too many rooms—too many people coming in and out.”

  Maggie sat stiffly on the edge of the sofa. “I’m not going to let you go back there.”

  There was a sad smile on his face. “If I stayed here, what would I do with myself? Sit around. I might as well be in the hospital. I need to work at something that’s my own. The doctors call it therapy.”

  “I don’t care what they call it.”

  “Do you have a ranch?” Cathleen was intrigued by the discovery.

  “Yes. It’s called the Shamrock Ranch.”

  “Is it as big as ours?”

  “No. I don’t think there’s anything as big as the Triple C,” admitted O’Rourke.

  “I’ll bet you wish it was,” she stated.

  “No, I don’t think so, because I’d always have to worry about someone trying to steal part of it from me. Now, my ranch is so small, no one would bother trying to steal it,” he explained.

  “You can’t make a living off of it,” Maggie reminded him. “If it’s work you want, Chase can hire you to work here.”

  “Let Culley decide for himself what he wants, Maggie,” Chase advised quietly.

  “But he isn’t—” She didn’t finish the sentence, stopping gui
ltily and looking apologetically at her brother.

  “I’m not well enough. Is that what you were going to say?” he asked.

  “Culley, I’m sorry. I didn’t really mean it that way. It’s just that it’s been a long time since you’ve done physical labor. You’re older and—”

  “I want to go home, Maggie.”

  Chase took the matter out of her hands, knowing she would never agree. “We’ll drive you over to the ranch tomorrow morning. In the meantime, you’ll stay the night with us.”

  “Is your ranch far away? Can I come visit you sometime?” Cathleen wanted to know.

  “We’re practically next-door neighbors. You can come see me any time you want.” Too long deprived of it, he seemed to feed on Cathleen’s blithe innocence and ready attention.

  “He sure has changed,” Ty remarked idly and lit a cigarette. O’Rourke was upstairs, washing up before dinner.

  “So it seems,” his father murmured, but he appeared contemplative. “Just the same, I don’t want your mother or Cathleen alone in the house with him. So I want you to stay here tonight while I drive up to the north camp and let Arch Goodman know that O’Rourke’s moving into the Shamrock.”

  “Why?” Ty questioned the order. “The doctors released him, so they must be convinced he’s harmless.”

  “No one and nothing is harmless, Ty.” Dryness rustled through his voice. “There could be two reasons why he doesn’t want to live here. One, he could know that the past can be forgiven, but rarely is it forgotten. The thought might have choked him to sleep under a Calder roof, eat Calder food, and drink Calder water. Two, he might be smart enough to know I’d have someone watching him all the time.”

  “Don’t you trust him?”

  “I’m just being cautious,” his father said. “He’s going to need help making that shack habitable again, so I want you to give him a hand.”

  “Me? Why?”

  “Because I thought you might like to get off by yourself for a couple of weeks.” No response was expected, and Ty didn’t offer one. But it was true he needed time alone to come to terms with the broken engagement to Tara. And he suspected O’Rourke would keep pretty much to himself, so it would be the same as being alone. “We’ve been running Shamrock cattle on our graze, so I want to let Arch know he’ll have to plan on separating them from our herd. O’Rourke never had much for saddle stock, so we’ll see what we can spare as soon as he’s got a corral built to hold them. He’ll need tools, lumber, provisions.”