Waiting for Morning (The Brides Of Last Chance Ranch Series)

by Margaret Brownley

  “The whole idea of advertising for an heiress is ridiculous,” she scoffed, shaking her head. “Even Mr. Vanderbilt with all his money didn’t have such an abundance of heirs.” Before his death Cornelius Vanderbilt was considered the richest man in America.

  She’d lost count of how many women had traveled to Cactus Patch in answer to Miss Walker’s advertisement. The way some of them carried on, you’d think they’d been offered husbands instead of cattle.

  One by one those women had left—all except Kate Tenney, but that was only because Bessie made Luke chase the girl all the way to Boston. Had she not put her foot down and talked some sense into him, her nephew would have let a perfectly good woman slip away.

  “It’s a crying shame that none of you have anything better to do with yourselves than throw away your money,” she said, reaching for a box of her favorite chocolate bonbons. The problem with the men in this town was that they drank and gambled too much.

  “Ah, come on, Bessie. What could it hurt?” Green urged.

  Bessie was tempted, God forgive her. “What if you’re all wrong and no one wins?”

  “Then we’ll donate the money to the church.”

  Bessie hesitated. No one had been right in the past about how long a girl would last at the ranch. Why, even she was convinced Kate wouldn’t survive twenty-four hours and the poor girl lasted a full four months. But if this current “heiress” had a brother in a wheelchair . . . hmm. The church could use the money and . . . She caught herself in the nick of time.

  “Gambling is wrong, no matter what,” she said with a toss of her head. At least someone in this town knew how to resist temptation.

  Trotter chomped down on his stogie and hooked his thumbs around his overall straps. “Are you telling us that you have no opinion?” He looked incredulous.

  “She has an opinion on everything else,” Green said.

  All four men stared at her and Bessie cleared her throat. “Of course I have an opinion. I think the woman will surprise us all and last . . . two months.” Any woman traveling all this way with a brother in a wheelchair had to have some starch in her.

  This brought a round of laughter from the others.

  “I tell you what,” Hargrove said with a magnanimous air. “I’ll put in for Bessie.” He tossed a shiny coin on the counter. “Put her down for two months.”

  Not to be outdone, the others slapped coins onto the counter on Bessie’s behalf.

  Smiling to herself, Bessie continued her shopping. Even if by some miracle she won what was now a healthy pot of dough, no one could accuse her of gambling.

  Molly grabbed the pot of coffee and yawned. She couldn’t help it. She’d hardly slept from worrying about Donny. Several times during the night she’d lit the oil lantern and tiptoed through the quiet house to his room. Only upon hearing his steady breathing could she relax enough to creep back to her own bed.

  Donny wasn’t the only reason she couldn’t sleep. A night cough that started during the fire kept her awake and none of the usual remedies worked. Her throat still felt parched.

  It was more than just lack of sleep that had her yawning. It was getting up at four in the morning and having to be ready to work at five.

  She lifted the lids off the covered metal pans arranged on the buffet in the formal dining room. No one else was around and the long table for twelve looked anything but inviting.

  The flapjacks, scrambled eggs, and bacon smelled good, but who could eat at such an ungodly hour? It was all she could do to force the strong bitter brew down her throat before she headed out the door.

  To make matters worse, outside it was cold as a well-digger’s knees. Her baggy shirt offered little protection from the chill, even with its long sleeves.

  The sun had yet to rise and the sky was dull as tarnished silver. Following the sound of male voices, she turned the corner of the barn and a group of men turned to gape at her. One man gave a low whistle. Another’s eyebrows disappeared beneath the brim of his high-crown hat.

  One cowpoke’s eyes practically bulged out of his weathered face. He scratched his temple, frowned, and cleared his throat. “They call me Ruckus.”

  “Pleased to meet you. My name is Molly Hatfield and I’m Miss—”

  “I know who you are.” He turned to the other men, all still gaping at her. “This here is Miss Walker’s new heiress. Name’s Miss Hatfield. Same rules apply as before. No cussing in the lady’s presence.”

  The men whistled, clapped, and whooped until a man pointed his pistol at the sky and fired. A hawk took off from atop the barn, horses whinnied, and a cattle dog barked in the distance, but the men all fell silent.

  Ruckus walked around the circle saying each man’s name out loud. The man who’d shot the pistol was O.T. “That there is Stretch,” he said, indicating the man she’d met the day before. He was the tallest of the bunch. “I reckon you won’t disremember him.”

  Stretch tipped his hat. “And I ain’t likely to disremember her.”

  Wishbone swept off his hat when he was introduced, his legs so bowed he looked like he was sitting on an invisible horse. Mexican Pete kicked Wishbone in the behind, sending him sprawling to the ground. It was a jovial group and reminded Molly of Saturday night at Big Jim’s Saloon when everyone was in a festive mood and ready to have a good time after a week’s hard labor.

  Ruckus then surprised Molly by leading the group in prayer. Molly followed Ruckus’s lead and lowered her head respectfully. The last time she’d prayed in a group was three years ago when that awful cave-in trapped several miners. The entire town had turned out to hold vigil and pray—for all the good it did them. The fact that these cowhands thought to start the day with prayer was unsettling to say the least. Was ranch work so dangerous that they needed to pray every day?

  After the others walked away, Ruckus explained her duties. “Me and the boys have some branding to do, but you ain’t up to that yet.”

  He sent her to the horse corral to meet with a man named Brodie, who barely bothered looking up when she introduced herself. Instead, he kept his gaze on a large black horse bucking around in a circle, kicking up its hind legs.

  The horse trainer was a compact man, his long sandy hair tied at the base of his neck with a piece of rawhide. A scraggly beard covered the lower half of his face while sharp, observant brown eyes commanded the upper. She guessed him to be in his late twenties or early thirties.

  “What do you know about horses?” he asked in a voice made gravelly by tobacco.

  “I know how to ride.” She tossed a nod at the mustang. “What’s the matter with him?”

  “Not a thing.” Brodie spit out a stream of brown juice. “That’s the first time he’s been saddled. His name’s Lightning.”

  Lightning raced toward the fence and Brodie snapped his whip. That stopped the horse from jumping but not from running.

  A Mexican cowhand walked by. “Muy mala,” he called out. Very bad.

  “Not bad,” Brodie called back. “Just spirited.” The Mexican shrugged and kept going.

  Lightning slowed as he made the turn and headed toward them. Brodie slapped his whip against the ground and the horse gave a double hock kick and picked up speed.

  Brodie nodded toward the animal. “His nature is to run when confronted with something new. He’s gotta learn that runnin’ will do him no good. I’m his last chance. He don’t make it with me, he don’t make it with no one.”

  He tossed her a pair of buckskin gauntlets and handed her a second whip. “Stand over there by that gate and make sure he don’t escape.”

  Slipping her hands into the leathery softness, Molly crossed to the gate. The horse stopped running, pawed the ground, and turned in a circle as if chasing his tail. The saddle remained secure.

  “Yee-ow,” Brodie yelled. Lightning ran by him and Brodie responded by cracking the whip against the horse’s heels. He then chased after the horse, popping his whip each time Lightning tried to climb a fence with his powerful le
gs.

  The horse ran to the far end of the corral and jumped. Smashing into the corral fence he fell, landing on his side with a thump and stirring up a cloud of dust.

  Molly stared in wide-eyed horror over gloved fingertips. The man with his yelling and cracking whip obviously didn’t know what he was doing.

  Lightning stretched his front legs, pushed out his head, and struggled upright. The horse looked groggy and uncertain.

  Brodie grabbed the halter rope and tied Lightning to the fence outside the corral.

  “You’re lucky he didn’t break his neck,” she charged, not bothering to hide her anger.

  “Or break the neck of a rider,” Brodie said, his demeanor calm. “Let’s hope he learned his lesson.”

  Lesson? She frowned. “What would have happened had he jumped over the fence without falling?”

  “I would have made him fall,” Brodie said simply. “What he doesn’t learn on his own I’ve got to teach him. That’s my job. A ranch can’t run without well-trained horses.” He tossed a nod toward the open desert. “You never know what you might encounter out there. Could be a rattler. Could be a raging bull, a wolf, or a bandit. A cowboy’s life depends on how his horse reacts to adversity.” He snapped the ground with his whip. “Let’s get to work.”

  Molly spent the rest of the morning learning how to turn a wild horse into a tame one. Brodie was a patient teacher, his movements efficient but never hurried. Now that she understood the reason behind his methods, she realized he was firm but never harsh or cruel.

  “I learned to train horses in Mexico,” he explained as they took a midmorning break in the shade of the windmill. He dipped a metal cup into the water tank and drank it down in one gulp. Wiping his whiskered chin with the back of his hand, he continued.

  “Mexicans are the best riders. They don’t treat horses like pets. A horse is a cowboy’s partner and it’s all serious.”

  “Would it be okay if I ride one of those?” she asked, pointing to a row of saddled horses tied outside the corral. She was a good rider and anxious to check out the ranch.

  “Not unless you got yourself a hole ready. I ain’t got time to dig no grave.” He laughed at her expression before explaining, “Ain’t none of them ever been ridden. They’re gettin’ used to saddles and learning how to stand quietly. What you see is a bunch of horses learning patience.” He gave her a cockeyed glance. “I reckon that’s a virtue you know nothing about.”

  “I know about patience,” she said. “And what I know, I don’t much like.”

  She stared at the next corral over. A black colt held his head to the ground. Keeping his forelegs in place, he moved his back legs sideways in a circle. He then lifted his head and bounded to the other side. What a strange horse.

  Brodie followed her gaze. “He’s blind,” he said simply.

  Molly frowned. The horse looked so carefree, so vibrant and full of life, it was hard to imagine that anything was wrong with him. “But he looks so . . . happy.”

  “Reckon he don’t know any better. Soon as he weans, we’re gonna have to let him go. He won’t be any good around here.”

  A surge of protectiveness shot through her. “Let him go? You mean set him free? But he won’t survive.”

  Brodie shrugged. “Not my problem. Not yours either. Our job is to train horses to work. If they can’t do the job, they’re no good to us.”

  Molly continued to watch the young horse. How she envied the little fellow’s exuberance. Or maybe it was his ignorance she envied, for he had yet to learn that physical handicaps were often met with cruelty and disdain.

  Sensing Brodie watching her, she pulled her gaze away from the colt. “How long have you been training horses?”

  “Since I was knee-high to a jackrabbit,” he said.

  “They respect you,” she said. “They watch you like a teacher.”

  “They’re watching me like a prisoner watches a guard. I’m keeping them from freedom. They figured out my weaknesses long before I figured out theirs. They’ve already figured out yours.”

  “What weak—” But already he’d turned his back and walked away.

  The morning passed quickly and a distant bell sounded.

  “Lunch,” Brodie called from a distance.

  She gaped at him. Already? It wasn’t possible. Her heart thudded. Donny. She raced to the ranch house as quickly as her unfamiliar pegheeled boots would allow.

  How could she have forgotten to get her brother out of bed?

  Chapter 7

  He ran through the grass, the wind in his hair, the sun in his face. He kept running and running as if never to stop. He didn’t know what he was running to or even from, but he had to keep running because . . .

  Donny woke with a start. Fighting to hold on to the dream as long as possible, he didn’t dare move. But the sweet smell of grass and the wind in his hair soon faded away like popping bubbles, along with the rest of his dream. Only the memory of running remained.

  Every night it was the same dream. Every morning he woke to the reality of his life. He couldn’t walk, let alone run. He could barely manage to put on his own shirt.

  A clanging sound in the distance made him glance at the mechanical clock next to his bed. Noon. He couldn’t believe it. No wonder his stomach growled.

  Where was Molly? It wasn’t like her to keep him waiting so long. Had something happened to her? The thought sent cold chills down his spine. The Dobson Creek fire made him realize like never before how much he depended on his sister. Without her he couldn’t survive.

  Had Molly been injured? Was that why she was so late? What if she never returned? Heart thumping, he hung his head over the side of his bed and dangled his arms, his fingertips barely reaching the floor. Slowly he eased his shoulders over the edge of the mattress. He placed the palms of his hands on the floor. Tears of frustration sprang to his eyes and sweat trickled down his forehead.

  Blinking away the moisture, he measured the distance to his wheelchair. It looked like a mile away, though the room was only a few feet wide. He tried pulling himself forward using his arms, but it was no good. He wasn’t strong enough. Feeling helpless as a slug, he gasped for breath.

  He’d die rather than let Molly know how much he hated his life, hated being crippled, hated having to depend on her to get him out of bed in the morning and put him there at night. He hated the pitying looks from others—if they bothered looking at him at all.

  If only he could escape that dream. Dreaming about running only made his reality that much worse. Sometimes, like today, he wished he were dead.

  He was still half on, half off the bed when Molly burst through the door.

  “Drat!” Eleanor Walker rested her hands on the pommel of her saddle and stared at the barbed wire fence that someone had cut. The problem was worse than she thought.

  Robert Stackman rode his gelding beside her roan. He was both her banker and friend, but he would be more if she would let him. Each year on her birthday he proposed marriage; each year she turned him down.

  The ranch couldn’t survive such a partnership. Robert was too practical, too money-oriented. He understood finances, not cattle. To him, profits were much more important than legacies. He never sat up all night nursing a horse or delivering a calf. He knew nothing about the soul of a ranch or its heart.

  She knew from painful experience that such differences would ruin a marriage and for this reason she chose to settle for friendship— nothing more. But it was a friendship she deeply valued.

  “What did I tell you?” she said.

  The grazing cattle by her windmill were not her own. She dug the wells and other cattlemen reaped the benefits. The sheer number of beeves from neighboring ranches worried her. An even greater concern was the eastern investor who wanted to finance a cattle company in the area. The man knew nothing about cattle and even less about conserving land.

  Robert’s horse whickered and pawed the ground. “Whoa, boy.” A firm square jaw, crinkly blue eyes
, and proud turn of head hinted at the good-looking man he must have been in his youth. At age sixty-two he was now more distinguished than handsome and his lush black hair had long since turned silver.

  “I agree, it’s a problem,” he said.

  “And it’s about to get worse.”

  She thought she’d seen and done it all, but this latest onslaught of ranch companies and overgrazed ranges was something new. Three and four times the number of cattle than an acre could sustain had flooded the area in recent months. So far there had been no problems because of the record amount of rain in the past year, but sure as the day was long, another drought was around the corner. Less rain meant less vegetation, resulting in thinner cattle and lower market prices.

  She narrowed her eyes. “If Mr. Hamshank has his way, the land won’t be good for anything.” For two cents she would gladly tell the man what he could do with his cattle company.

  “I believe his name is Mr. Hampshire,” Robert said.

  “Hamshank, Hampshire, what difference does it make? The man’s an idiot.” Eleanor tried not to let her anger get the best of her, but how could she not?

  It wasn’t just a ranch, it was her life—had been for more than forty years ever since her family’s wagon broke down on this very spot on the way to the California gold mines.

  “Did I ever tell you about the Englishman?” she asked.

  “The one your mother nursed back to health and who returned the favor with a heifer?”

  She nodded. Her mother had considered that young cow her last chance to save her family from poverty’s door. From those humble beginnings grew one of the largest and most successful cattle ranches in all of Arizona Territory.

  “That same Englishman also gave us a book of Shakespeare. I never met an Englishman who didn’t carry the bard with him, did you?”