“Perhaps some beans. The supplies I carry are meager.”
Noble scooped some dried beans from the barrel into a poke. He handed the small canvas bag to the man.
“How much do I owe you?”
Noble shook his head. “Nothing. You can leave now.”
The reverend sighed. “Very well. But I shall pray for your soul and that you and Mrs. Corey will do the right thing and save yourself from eternal damnation and the fires of hell.”
“It’s settled, Reverend,” Noble said curtly. “Good day.” He waited until he was sure that the man was mounted and on his way.
“Are you all right?” he asked her again.
“Yes, I’ll be fine.”
“I’ll be outside if you need me.” He was anxious to get away so he could think.
“Yes.” The words came out so flatly that Noble found a stab of remorse.
In the sunshine, he leaned back against the fresh post he had used to resurrect the sagging stable.
Spotted Horse rode in and dismounted. “You sick, Noble?” the Osage asked.
“No. My wife’s husband has returned from the war.”
“He is here?” the Indian asked.
“No, no. He’s at their old home in Arkansas.”
Spotted Horse fell silent for a moment, his eyes stared at the plains as Noble’s were doing. Then he spoke softly, “You speak of white man ways.”
Noble studied the toes of his boots. “Her husband went to war for three winters. Now he’s home. We thought he was dead.”
“Three winters?” Spotted Horse shook his head, his braids flying around his shoulders, the eagle feather swaying in the wind. “Why so long?”
“He was fighting a war.”
“Perhaps he is a ghost?”
“Maybe. He haunts me,” Noble said aloud, but his thoughts were silent. She can’t leave. He wondered how he would convince her to stay.
Having reached his own decision, Noble went back inside the store. He closed the door and leaned against it, not wanting any interruptions. For a moment he felt hopeless looking at her sad face.
“I’ll have to go pack.” Fleta’s tear-filled words knifed him. Her swollen eyes and air of dejection summed up her torment. “Noble, I am legally his wife. There is nothing else to do but go back to him.”
Noble was frustrated by his inability to do something to assert his rights. He and Fleta had accomplished a great deal together. Their business was thriving; they were building a future together. She couldn’t possibly go back to Wilbourne!
He combed his fingers through his hair and frowned. “Fleta, what if ... what if he won’t accept you back?”
She sat on the rocker he had traded from a passing settler.
“Then I’ll—” she broke off and burst into tears. Putting her hands to her face, she sobbed. “This is all my fault. I wanted you so badly that I sinned. I’m living in sin.”
“No!” Noble rushed across the room and knelt in front of her. “This is no sin, Fleta. God didn’t want you and Luke to starve. No kind of God wanted that. Damnation, Fleta! What we did was not wrong.
“Let him find another woman. He left you. If he really cared he would have come back before now. Fleta, I would never leave you like that. Kansas is our home now. Stay with me.”
She drew her hands away from her wet face and looked at him pleadingly. “Noble, I don’t know what to do.”
“Stay here.”
Numbly she slipped to her knees and fell into his arms. Her sorrow drenched his shoulder. They held each other for a long time. He knew their problem was not settled, but a firm resolve fermented in his mind. He would not give her up.
The next morning, Fleta was no closer to reaching a decision. She was tense, her nerves stretched tautly. When she dropped a cup and it shattered at her feet, she jumped back as though shot. Her favorite tea cup was in fragments at her feet. To her, it represented her peaceful, secure life with Noble.
Mannah stopped her as she bent to pick up the pieces.
“I will clean it up, Fleta. You are trembling so much you might cut yourself.”
“Am I that bad?” she asked ruefully.
“Yes.”
Fleta had grown very close to Mannah. The Indian woman was accepted by the white customers, and her skills with the Indians amazed Fleta. The Osage wife quickly learned arithmetic and a varied English vocabulary.
“You can never go home,” Mannah said as she rose with the broken porcelain in her hand.
Fleta frowned. “What do you mean?”
“They will not accept you. Even the dogs will bite you. Your first man will wonder how you could have slept with another. He will question what the other man did to you. How it was with him. His jealous mind will go crazy. He will treat you as a used thing.
It will not be the same. Nothing is as it was. It will be very different.”
Fleta’s upper teeth cut into her lower lip. Would Wilbourne act like that toward her? Perhaps he would be angry? How did Mannah know so much?
Then Fleta remembered Mannah was not an Osage. Had she returned to her own people one time and had the Indian camp dogs snipped at her heels?
Cold silence would be her sentence if she returned to Arkansas. Wilbourne would busy himself with his farming and expect his meals on time. He would snore at night and ignore her, except when he felt some urge. Then he would use her body to punish her for her sins. And he would be within a husband’s rights.
Fleta closed her eyes and silently sorted out her options. God will have to forgive me. I couldn’t stand such penance. No, Luke and I will have a better life with Noble. We will stay here with him.
She planned to tell Noble her decision to remain when he returned to the fort. Earlier, Spotted Horse reported an approaching wagon train, and Noble went to meet them. It was now his custom to ride ahead and greet the newcomers. He moved from wagon to wagon, shaking hands and extolling the store goods. He was very proficient at hawking their wares. Sometimes too good, she thought. Business would become so booming that at the end of the day she would collapse into a chair, drained of strength. How long would this new stream of customers be in the store? She wanted a few moments alone with Noble so she could tell him her decision. She looked out the small window and she wished he would hurry.
The gray acted frisky as they crossed the green waving grass. Noble was pleased he hadn’t wind-broken the big horse by pushing him so hard returning from Independence. Truly this horse was the greatest Noble had ever owned. He must have cost the head bushwhacker, Captain Watson, a pretty penny.
Even in the early morning the May sun was building up heat. Meadowlarks whistled and quail conversed with their mates. In the distance the wagon hoops snaked toward Noble. He set the gelding into a rocking lope and rode toward the outriders in front of the line.
Colonel Rupert Lyons, a man with bearing and a white pointed beard, was the wagonmaster. He wore a deerskin outfit with enough quills and beads on it to make a squaw jealous. Noble guessed that Lyons might be more comfortable wearing a suit. There was a certain sophistication about the man that the frontier fringe could not hide.
“We’ve heard about you,” the colonel said after Noble had introduced himself. “You’re supposed to be the most honest merchant west of Missouri.”
Noble thanked him and rode alongside the lead wagon. “We don’t sell whiskey to settlers or to the Indians. We give the customers every consideration and courtesy.”
Rupert nodded. “We’ll camp at your fort tonight. You know how people are. Two weeks out and they figure they’ve forgot something. Guess that’s why a store out here is good business.”
“Reckon so,” Noble said amiably. “If you don’t mind, I’ll ride back and speak to folks, tell them what we have. It saves time later.”
“Of course.” Rupert tilted his head back and studied Noble. “Wait,” he said, reaching out a hand to still him. “Where did you get that hat?”
Noble grinned and pushed the brim up
with his thumb. “In Independence. A man named Stetson made it in Philadelphia.”
“That’s some hat,” the colonel said with admiration. “Would you consider selling it?”
Noble shook his head. “Afraid not. It was a gift.” He turned and started down the line. Some of the folks were friendly. He shook hands, answered questions, bantered with them, and told them some of the things he had on hand at the store. Other members of the wagon train were sullen, suspicious and tight lipped. In the case of the latter, he would just smile and ride onto the next wagon.
Oxen powered most of the wagons. A few draft horse teams could be seen, but they were hard to slow to a steer’s gait. And horses could not forage and live off the land the way the oxen could. Horses needed grain to work.
Noble approched a thin faced man walking beside his double team of oxen. A troubled look crossed the man’s face as Noble rode closer. The man appeared to be growing angry.
“My gun, Mary! Get my gun!” the man shouted and bolted for the wagon box. Noble read the bewilderment in the woman’s expression. The settler dodged and ducked around the front wheel and tried to get the rifle away from her and out of the wagon.
“He’s riding my gray horse!” he screamed. “That’s my horse!”
Noble went cold at the man’s words. He practically called him a horse thief. This gray was Captain Watson’s horse—somehow he must talk sense into the man.
“Hold up!” Noble shouted, but the man wrenched the rifle from his wife’s desperate grip. Noble’s hand sought the butt of the Colt on his right hip. The settler staggered back and fired. The bullet plowed in the dust but caused the gray to rear on his hind feet.
“Give me the powder,” the red faced man shouted to his pale faced wife. When she did not respond to his request, the man took the barrel in both hands and raised the stock to use as a club on Noble. He charged with a deep throated growl.
The Colt barked in Noble’s hand. The bullet’s impact slammed into the man, stopping him with sledge hammer force. The rifle fell, barely brushing Noble’s stirrup as the wounded man’s mask of anger melted and he collapsed to his knees.
The woman’s shrill cry caused Noble’s jaw to stiffen as he fought the excited grey.
The red flow through the man’s fingers, clamped over his chest, told Noble the wound was serious. The woman stumbled and fell trying to come to her husband’s aid; but she never reached him before he pitched face down and his legs kicked involuntarily in death’s throes.
“You’ve killed him! Oh, my God, you’ve killed him,” she screamed.
Others came rushing to the scene. Noble felt cold despite the sun’s heat when one of the wagon leaders looked up from examining the man.
“Mister, he must have lost his mind. What the hell was wrong? Did he know you?”
Noble shook his head. “No.”
“Nat Gunter was a bitter man, but he had no call to attack you.”
The man’s words were small comfort, Noble was still uncertain about the mood of the crowd. He gave the man a grateful nod.
“What happened?” someone called out.
“Gunter went crazy and shot at this man,” the witness repeated.
The colonel and his scouts came rushing in. The entire wagon train was in disarray. Noble dismounted and spoke to a few people in the edge of the crowd.
The wagonmaster waded in while two of his hard eyed employees sat their horses. Noble felt their eyes size him up.
Rupert emerged from the gathering. “He thought you had stolen his gray horse.”
Noble shook his head. “I bought this one in Arkansas.”
“Well, Gunter obviously thought you had stolen him.”
“Where was he from?” Noble asked.
“Missouri, somewhere.”
“I’m sorry, sir, for the trouble,” Noble apologized. “But he shot at me without warning and then attacked me with the rifle.” Noble felt queasy. Watson might have stolen him or even bought the horse from a thief. “I never stole this horse, Colonel,” Noble added with a direct look.
“Oh, I believe you. He just went mad when he saw that horse. times have been hard on people because of the war.”
Noble agreed. The widow’s sobbing was burned his ears. “Tell her I’m sorry.”
“I will,” the wagonmaster promised. He turned to the people. “Everyone, get to their wagons. There’s no more we can do here. Joe, Leonard, you take care of the body for Mrs. Gunter. We’re going on. Nothing more we can do.”
Noble rode back to the fort, his thoughts blighted by the shooting. Even a flushed prairie chicken did not raise his spirits. He questioned himself ruthlesly. Had he shot too quickly? Why hadn’t he just driven the gray into the man? How could he know someone stole the gray? But the vision of the man’s blood seeping through his fingers and his desperate wife crawling toward him would not go away.
Deeply depressed, Noble rode through the fort gate. He raised his eyes when Fleta came outside in a new dress that was as blue as her eyes.
Noble’s heart began to hammer, then stilled to nearly a stop. She was leaving.
“Noble, what’s wrong?” she asked, seeing the stricken look on his face.
He dismounted with leaden boots, swept his hat off, and mopped the perspiration from his brow on his sleeve. “It’s been a bad day and I have a feeling it just got worse.” He issued a great sigh.
“Noble ... I’ve decide to stay,” she said quietly, her eyes downcast.
“What?” Noble jerked his head up and willed her to look at him.
“Aren’t you pleased?” she asked.
“Lord, yes!” He rushed forward and swept her into his arms. His mouth pressed against her hair and face, his strong arms crushed her to him.
Fleta almost laughed at his reckless abandon. His guns were digging into her stomach and his passionate caresses were almost obscene. She was Fleta McCurtain, God forgive her. If He would.
Chapter Six
In June, 1865, a new kind of train came out of the Indian Territory, one made of longhorn cattle as far as the eye could see.
“Wonder where those cattle are headed?” Noble asked Spotted Horse. The two men squatted on a gentle rise, watching the approaching longhorns.
“Plenty of them,” Spotted Horse said.
The two men rode out earlier that morning to meet the cattle drivers. Before he left, Noble called on the two Osage men he had come to rely on. Rivers and Barge, armed with rifles, listened to his instructions on guarding the fort.
Noble had little reason to suspect problems. According to Spotted Horse, no other wagons were coming. The Osage chief spent most of his days searching for prospective customers or troublemakers—a job he took very seriously.
Fortunately, since they did not sell whisky, few of the riff-raff type came by the store. Temperance was a new word to Noble, and it impressed and surprised his customers.
A haze of dust lifted, churned up by thousands of hooves coming behind the giant lead steer with his jangling bell. Cowboys rode on either side of the trail-broken cattle. Amidst bawling, dust and shouts, the line of longhorns snaked north.
Two wagons with sun-cured yellow tops paralleled the stream. A separate large herd of saddle stock was being driven behind the wagons.
Noble set the gray toward a man shouting directions.
Politely, he and Spotted Horse stopped short and waited for the man to ride over to them.
“Howdy,” the tall man greeted them. His tanned face held a down-to-earth honesty which Noble respected.
“Howdy, I’m Noble McCurtain and this is Spotted Horse. We have a trading post about a day’s drive north of here.”
“Am I about out of Indian Territory?”
“Yes, you’re probably in Kansas now.” Noble smiled at the man’s heartfelt sigh of relief.
“Well, thank God for that. I’m Toby Evans from Fort Worth, Texas.” He extended a calloused hand for them to shake. “Glad to meet you two. I’m sorry, Spotted Horse, but I
’ve paid more tributes to Indians than I ever knew existed. We’re headed for Independence, Missouri. Can I make it, you reckon?”
“Certainly, but it’ll take you a month,” Noble informed him.
“Hell, I ain’t got nothing but time. Steers are worth ten cents in Texas.”
“A pound?” Noble asked.
“Gawd, no! A head.”
Noble did a quick calculation. “Do you own all of these cattle?”
Evans shook his head. “If I had that much money, I’d never have made this drive in the first place.”
“At the price of beef in Independence, I figure you’ll make another drive,” Noble said wryly.
The man’s eyes lit up with anticipation. “Really?” He pounded his large saddle, his sun-squinted eyes surveying the cattle. Noble knew what the man was thinking about. Money. In his high crown hat, gun low on his slim hips, Toby Evans was about to become a man of means.
“McCurtain?” Toby asked, stretching his shoulders back. “I have a bunch of tail enders, road sore ones, heifers heavy with calves. Odds and ends. You wouldn’t be interested in swapping them for supplies, would you?”
“How much for them?” Noble asked. He tried to appear indifferent.
“They ain’t worth much to me,” Evans said. “Say, fifty-cents a head.”
Noble knew his answer before the man had even spoken. Big steers could be broken and used to replace the oxen. Broken to a yoke, they would be worth forty or fifty dollars a team. Cows would beget more. While the steers were still sore footed from the long drive, he could easily break them. “All right, Evans. You got a deal,” he said with a grin. He reached out and shook hands with the man, sealing their bargain.
“Good enough, McCurtain. We’ll need supplies. Flour and beans, a few other essentials.”
“You keep going north.” Noble pointed. “You can’t miss our place.”
The men parted. Noble and Spotted Horse headed back to the fort. He was sure the Osage would not be as pleased as he was about the purchase of the cattle. The bucks considered oxen rather dull and stupid, but they would help him break them.
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