by With Heart
“Who isn’t? She works hard and isn’t in the least snooty. By the way, I put a hunk of cheese in the box, our thanks for the big order.”
“I’m obliged.”
“Good luck at the rodeo, Johnny.”
“Thanks.”
• • •
When Kathleen left the store, she was angry at Johnny and angry at herself for having been glad to see him. Embarrassment mingled with her anger. She had been about to make a fool of herself and ask him if he’d like to go to Red Rock to see the Tom Dolans. She should be grateful that he made his feelings perfectly clear.
Damn him! If he thought she was chasing after him, he could just get that thought out of his block head. But the idea that he could be thinking that cut her to the quick.
She was so engrossed in her thoughts that she almost ran into the two men coming toward her. She looked up and recognized them immediately. The two toughs who had attempted to steal her car and her money stood there brazenly grinning at her. Temper that had been simmering since Johnny’s snub, boiled up. With her hands on her hips, she stopped in front of them, barring their way.
“How come you’re not in jail?” she almost yelled.
“Well, looky here. If it ain’t that feisty redhead we helped get outta the ditch.” The one called Webb grinned inanely, showing stained, broken teeth.
“Helped, my hind leg!” The tone of Kathleen’s voice was keeping pace with her temper. “You . . . you piles of horse dung! You were hijacking my car.”
“Hijackin’ ya? Hear that, Webb? She ain’t grateful a’tall fer what we done. You’d’a thought a uppity-up like her’d have manners and give us a little somethin’ more than a jawin’ out fer all the help we done a pushin’ her car. Like a little kiss maybe.”
“Listen to me, you mangy polecats,”—Her eyes glittered with the light of battle—“I don’t know why you’re not in jail where you belong, but you can bet your filthy hide I’m going to find out.”
“Ya go on and do that, baby doll,” Webb leered at her. “Say, sugar, how ’bout goin’ honky-tonkin’ tonight? Otis and his Ring-tail Tooters is playin’ out at the Twilight Gardens. There’s a gal there what’s goin’ to show us how to do the jitterbug dance. Ya’ve seen it done, ain’t ya?”
“You’re out of your mind if you think I’d be caught dead with warthogs like you.” She wrinkled her nose in a contemptuous sneer.
“She ain’t goin’ to be friendly. It’s a pure-dee shame. Guess we better be on our way.”
“Not so fast . . . scum! Johnny Henry told the sheriff about you.”
“Yeah. Fat lot a good it done him. Now get outta the way. We ain’t got no time to stand here jawin’ with a . . . high-tone split-tail when we got things to do.” He reached out and grasped her upper arms.
Rage gave Kathleen strength to jerk her arm loose and swing her fist. The blow caught Webb on the side of his face. He let out an angry yelp and raised his hand to slap her.
“Hit me, you yellow-bellied buzzard bait, and some dark night you’ll get a belly full of lead!” she shouted as she was suddenly pushed aside. Johnny was between her and the two men.
“Touch her, and I’ll bury you.”
“She started it. She hit me.”
“You grabbed her. I saw you.”
“Yeah? Well go tell it to the sheriff. She ain’t nothin’ but a—”
“—Say it, and your nose will be smeared all over your ugly face.”
“Why aren’t they in jail?” Kathleen demanded.
“I don’t know.” Johnny glanced at her, then back, as the two men began to edge around him. “But I’ll find out. Go on, get off the street. You’ve given the folks a show. I’ll take them down to the sheriff.”
“Won’t do no good. We been there and told him how it was.”
“You can tell him again why you threatened Miss Dolan. Come on,” Johnny snarled, and prodded them ahead of him.
“She come on to us,” Webb yelled. “She wild as a harelipped mule! Redheaded wildcat is what she is.”
Kathleen watched as Johnny herded the two men off down the street. He had rescued her again. She looked around and saw that several people had stopped along the street to watch the show. With tears of rage and frustration in her eyes, she hurried on down the street to the Gazette. Thank goodness Adelaide wasn’t in the office when she reached it, and she had time to gather herself together before she had to face her.
This had not been her best day. Not by a long shot! First the randy deputy, then the ranting cobbler, and the embarrassment of being brushed off by Johnny Henry. Finally seeing the miserable jayhawkers who had tried to rob her walking the street as free as air. It was all too much. She desperately wanted to cry, but her pride forbade it.
She heard the linotype machine start up and knew that Adelaide would be coming back. She hastily put a sheet of paper in her typewriter, dug in the basket on her desk for the information about the rodeo, and began to write. She wrote three lines, Xed them out, then started again.
The fifth annual Rawlings rodeo will be held at the Tillison County fair grounds Saturday Sept. 23. Fifteen contestants have signed up to compete in nine different events.
Johnny Henry, local rancher, who took home the purse last year for “Best All-Around Cowboy” will enter seven events.
The stock for the event will come from the McCabe ranch just south of the river in Dallam County, Texas.
Again this year the local churches will be in charge of the concession stands, and a variety of food and drink will be available.
The screen door was jerked open, and a big man with a star on his chest came in. He looked around the office, then down at her.
“May I help you?”
“You can if you’re Miss Dolan, and I think you are. There’s not many women—”
“—in town with hair as red as mine.” Kathleen finished for him and got to her feet. Looking up at him made her uncomfortable. “I’ve heard it a million times. You’re the sheriff.”
“How’d ya guess?” He hooked his thumbs in the pockets of his trousers and looked steadily at her.
Sheriff A. B. Carroll was a heavyset man with a big neck, broad shoulders, and short arms and legs. The hair beneath the brim of his Stetson was brown, the thick mustache on his upper lip brown sprinkled with gray. The bulge in his jaw, Kathleen suspected, was a plug of chewing tobacco. He wore his importance on his chest along with his badge. She decided then and there that she wasn’t going to like him.
“It wasn’t hard to figure it out. The star means that you’re either the sheriff or from the Star Ice Company. We got ice yesterday.”
“Smart-mouthed, just like Ell said.”
“Speaking of your deputy, are all women treated with such lecherous behavior when they go to the county sheriff’s office?”
“Those who ask for it.”
“And who is to be the judge of that?”
“I am. When I’m not there, my deputy is.”
“I’d like to remind you, Sheriff, that your salary and that of your ill-bred deputy, and the office you occupy are paid for by the taxpayers of this county, and they are entitled to be treated with civility.”
“You’ve not paid taxes here. What are you yippin’ about?”
“Hello, A. B., I thought I heard your voice out here.” Adelaide had come quietly into the office.
“Hello, Adelaide. I think you’ve got yourself a little hot-tempered chili pepper here. She just got into a fight out on the street. You know that I can’t have a woman, man either, brawlin’ in public. Doc says it ain’t a good image for the town.”
“Wait a gosh-darn minute,” Kathleen sputtered. “That man grabbed me. I had to defend myself.”
“They disagree. It’s two against one.”
“The two you’re referring to are the men who attempted to hijack me out on the highway the day I arrived here. They also took my money and would have gotten away with it if Johnny Henry hadn’t come along when he did. I’ll
sign a complaint against them.”
“Here we’ve got two sides again,” the sheriff said patiently. He turned and addressed his remarks to Adelaide. “Webb and Krome, the men this woman is accusing, told me that they had stopped to help her get her car out of the ditch. She offered to pay them. They took the money, but when Henry came along she accused them of stealing it. Now, I know that Webb and Krome aren’t good upstanding citizens; but I know them, and I don’t know her from a bale of hay. Why should I put two men in jail on her say-so?”
Kathleen swallowed down the knot of anger in her throat and forced herself to speak calmly.
“This has nothing to do with Adelaide, Sheriff Carroll. I’m the one involved here. I’m the one accusing your friends, Webb and Krome. My name is Miss Dolan, not her, not she, and not that woman. I’ll thank you to remember it and address your remarks to me.”
The sheriff sighed. “I’m just trying to get along here. I’ve got to satisfy everyone in this county, not just one newcomer who more than likely won’t be here this time next year.”
“Oh, I’ll be here, Sheriff. I’m not one to tuck tail and run when the going gets rough. I’ve been told that it’s the red hair. I’m not sure about that, but I do know that I’m stubborn, I’m determined, and I know when right is right. I don’t back down even when the law in town fails to do its job.”
“All right,” the sheriff said harshly. “This town is not paradise, miss. It’s just like any other town. Folks here are like folks everywhere—some are pretty decent, others so rotten they stink to high heaven. We’ve got some saints and some snakes. We do what we have to do to put up with ’em. My advice to you is to do the same.”
Johnny had opened the screen door and stepped inside while the sheriff was talking. Kathleen’s eyes went to him and found him looking at her from the concealing shadow of his hat brim. His dark eyes bore down at her with an intensity entirely different from the only time their eyes had caught while at the store. With reluctance she turned her gaze back to the sheriff.
“You’re not going to arrest them.” It was a statement that needed no answer, but he gave one.
“No, ma’am, I’m not.” His voice was stiletto-sharp.
The flat refusal drew a faint line of displeasure across her brow. It registered in the barest widening of her blue eyes; then, for an instant, her heavy lashes shuttered her gaze. Mentally, Kathleen had slumped. Physically, she stood with her shoulders back, her head up, and looked the man in the eye.
“I’ve learned a lot about this town today, Sheriff Carroll, but I’m reasonably sure that you’re not interested in my assessment.”
“You’re right about that, miss. This matter is ended, and I’ll be going.” He turned at the door. “I’ll speak to Ell about how you were treated in my office.”
After he had gone, Kathleen shifted her gaze to Johnny and away. Color touched her face. She stared down at the papers on the desk. For a short while she was wholly still, fighting down her embarrassment. When her eyes came up, she was again in control of her emotions.
“Well, I guess that’s that,” she said.
“I told him how it was. I didn’t know he was coming here until I saw his car,” Johnny told her.
“Do you believe his version of what happened?”
“Lord, no!” Points of light flared in Johnny’s dark eyes. “I was there, remember?”
“Not at first—”
“—I understand what’s happening. The sheriff is between a rock and a hard place on this. Someone higher up is calling the shots.”
“Doc Herman?” Adelaide asked, and turned her eyes to Paul, who had come from the back room with several pages to be proofed. More than likely he had waited until the sheriff left before coming in.
Kathleen spoke in answer to Adelaide’s question.
“Why would the mayor of the town have anything to say about how the county sheriff’s office is run?” She looked from one to the other, waiting for a reply. None was forthcoming until Adelaide sighed deeply and sank down in the chair behind her desk.
“It’s long and complicated, Kathleen.”
Johnny watched the emotions flick across Kathleen’s face. She had an agile brain and a pair of eyes that missed nothing. She also had guts she hadn’t used yet. A slow smile drew little wrinkles in the corner of his eyes. That redheaded temper of hers was going to get her in trouble. There was no doubt about it.
What surprised him was why he was here after he had gone to so much trouble to keep his distance. He had sprinted down the street when he saw one of the thugs she was talking to grab her. If the man had hit her, Johnny wasn’t sure what he would have done. He might have torn the man apart.
A desire to protect her washed over him. Christ, John Henry, if you have any sense, you’d say your good-byes and get the hell out of here.
“Got a minute, Johnny?” Paul asked. “I’ve got to turn around one of the cylinders on the press and I’ve only got two hands.”
“Sure. Glad to help.”
Kathleen sat down at her desk, turned, and faced her partner.
“Did I embarrass you, Adelaide? I didn’t mean to cause you more trouble.” Her eyes were clouded with distress.
“You didn’t embarrass me,” Adelaide said staunchly. “It’s hard for people in this town to accept strangers. They’re used to folks leaving here, not coming here.”
“Do you think it possible that those two men were sent out to hijack me, carry me off someplace, and frighten me so much that I’d be afraid to come back?”
“If they were, they met their match.” A smile tilted the corners of Adelaide’s mouth. “No, I don’t think they’d go that far. I had let it be known that a very bright young woman was buying into the paper. Doc Herman had offered to buy in and so had several others in town. I knew that if I let that happen, it wouldn’t be long before I lost control completely and Paul and I would be out on the street.”
“I’ve been wondering about something. If Doc Herman runs the town, why doesn’t he tell the merchants to stop advertising in the paper. Without advertising, you’d be out of business.”
“He doesn’t want us out of business. He uses us now and then when he wants to make his point about something.”
“Like what?”
“Last year he wanted to get the Greyhound bus rerouted so that it would come through here. He used the paper to get up a petition and to persuade the bus company officials that a town this size with its own newspaper would help to provide a steady stream of passengers.”
“Did it?”
“Oh, yes. It’s a convenience for those who travel, and I think maybe it helped Doc Herman’s clinic.”
• • •
In the back room, Johnny washed his greasy hands.
“Thanks for the help.” Paul handed him a towel. “I could have waited for Woody, but it would have made us late starting the run tomorrow.”
“Anytime. I am fascinated with machinery. I’ve been looking for parts so I can fix up an old earth mover I bought for a song.”
“What are you planning to use it for?”
“A storm cellar for one thing. I’m not anxious to dig it one spadeful at a time.” Johnny waited for Paul to finish washing, then said, “I guess Miss Dolan being here has taken a load off Adelaide?”
“Yes. I was a little leery at first. I wanted Addie to meet the person she was going to bring into her business, but she said that she could tell from the letters and the recommendation from the Liberal paper that Miss Dolan was going to be just what the Gazette needed to put some life back into the paper. Addie is seldom wrong.”
“Miss Dolan’s got spunk all right. I hope it doesn’t get her into more trouble.”
“She pretty, and she isn’t a dumbbell by a long shot.” Paul’s homely face broke into a grin. “Why don’t you take her to the picture show or for a ride? The girl needs an outing.”
“In my old truck? I’m sure she’d like that.” Johnny clapped Paul on the shoulder
. “You’re hog-tied, my friend, that’s plain to see. I’m not, and I’m going to stay that way.”
“You don’t have to marry her. Just take her out a time or two.”
“She’d laugh in my face if I asked her.”
“Bet ya two bits. It’d pay for the movie.”
“Naw. I’d best get on back to the ranch.”
Chapter Six
Johnny left the Gazette and walked quickly down the street toward where he’d left his truck. As he passed the grocery store, Mrs. Wilson called to him.
“Johnny, can you come in a minute?”
“Sure.” Inside the store he saw that Mrs. Wilson had an anxious look on her face.
“What’s wrong?”
“I’m worried about Miss Dolan. The men who had a set-to with her came in a while ago. I was down behind the counter looking for a dime I’d dropped, and I heard one of them say that before they left town that redheaded bitch was going to get what was coming to her. They’re downright mean, Johnny. They talked nasty about her.”
“What else did they say?”
“They said some words I don’t want to repeat.”
“You don’t have to. I can imagine what they were. Did they say anything about the sheriff or the deputy?”
“They said ‘Ell’ a time or two. It’s wasn’t ‘hell,’ Johnny, it was ‘Ell,’ referring to Deputy Thatcher. While they were here a couple of men came in and bought a box of shotgun shells. They were Cherokee. The one called Webb made a remark about blanket-asses having money to buy shells because they could get work at the tannery and decent white men couldn’t.”
“Did they get a rise out of the Indians?”
“No. They ignored them.”
“Mrs. Wilson, is it all right if I bring my supplies back in and leave them until morning? I’ve never had anything taken from the truck while it was parked on the street, but I don’t trust those two yahoos. I think I’d better stick around, keep an eye on them, and make sure Miss Dolan gets home all right.”
