by T. K. Lukas
“If that’s what you want to do, Stoney, it’s all right by me,” Barleigh answered.
“I’m glad we got that settled,” said Mario, hurrying off with his pitchfork in hand. Then, shouting over his shoulder, “Like I told Bar, Stoney, don’t stray too far. Be ready to jump and ride.”
“I’m headed to the foothills, Bar. I wouldn’t turn down some company,” said Hughes. “Weather this nice in November won’t last long.”
Their eyes met for a brief second before she turned away. “I don’t know. I—”
“Go. It’s a pretty day for a ride,” said Stoney. “Here, I’ll resaddle this gelding for you. He’s probably wondering why such a short ride this morning, anyway.”
“I can saddle my own horse, thanks.” Bar led the gelding out of the stall and tied him to the grooming post. “What? You want to treat me like I’m your goddamned little sister?” She spat on the ground, then with her free hand readjusted her crotch. Looking at Hughes, she spat again for good measure.
Stoney gave a nervous laugh and looked from Barleigh to Hughes. “Hey, I didn’t mean nothing. Just offering.”
“What’s got you so riled?” asked Mario, walking back in with a pitchfork full of fresh hay. “I saw you dance and get a kiss from Dorthea last night at the pie-eating contest. You should be in fine spirits this morning.”
“Maybe Bar’s in poor spirits because that’s all he got, a dance and a kiss. That’s still better than what some of us poor bastards went home with. Saddle up. Let’s ride.” Hughes spurred his horse away from the barn, anticipating Barleigh would follow. When he heard the sound of hoofbeats behind him, he eased his mare into a trot, pointing her toward the craggy, snow-capped mountains that flanked the sleeping city.
Silence lingered between them as they rode. The clear air, blue sky, and mild temperature induced a variety of birds into venturing out of their nests, the birds seeming happy to fill the quiet space with chattering and chirping.
As they neared the turn-off for the passage to the secret cave, Barleigh broke their silence. “A dance and a kiss is still better than what some of us poor bastards went home with? What were you expecting to go home with? A kiss you stole from me in a dark alley, which you led me down under unknown pretense—plus what else?”
Hughes threw back his head and laughed. “I was playing along, Miss ‘I can saddle my own horse because I’m not your goddamned little sister’ or whatever it was you said to Stoney. And for the record, I didn’t steal that kiss in the alley. I took it. Taking and stealing are two different things.”
“Oh really? Your semantics lesson impresses me.” Barleigh leaned back in her saddle as the horses began their descent into the canyon, lessening the weight her horse was bearing forward of his withers.
The steep passage into the cave required their precise attention, and conversation was sparse, the snowmelt and refrozen ground creating a treacherous pathway. Rocks and gravel slipped under foot, and both horses dropped their noses to the ground, careful to pick and choose their way to safe footing.
“We should picnic here in the glade instead of in the cave,” said Barleigh, once they reached the hidden clearing. She dismounted and looped the reins over a low-hanging branch.
“Out in the open where you feel safe that I won’t take advantage of you?” Hughes stood next to his mare and studied Barleigh, his amber eyes clouded and dark.
Barleigh cocked her head and looked at him, a confused expression on her face.
“I didn’t promise you last night that I wouldn’t want to kiss you. I promised you last night that I wouldn’t kiss you again. I keep my promises.” He turned away, the memory of the telegraph about Leighselle flooding his mind, and he couldn’t look at Barleigh. He kept his promises, all right, even those he hated keeping.
“I meant out in the open where the sky’s so blue and the weather’s fine for a picnic. What’s wrong?” Barleigh stepped forward and put her hand on his arm. “Are you all right?”
He stared at her hand on his arm—wanted to pick it up, to kiss each finger, to not stop there but to kiss her palm, the length of her arm, to kiss his way to her mouth and more. “Yes, I’m all right.”
He patted her hand like one would a child’s, then moved it away. “A picnic here in the glade is what we’ll do, then.” Reaching for his saddlebag, he lifted it from behind the cantle, setting it on the ground, removing the contents and arranging the plates and food on the unrolled blanket.
“You sure pack a fancy picnic,” said Barleigh, picking up the linen napkin and the cut crystal glass.
“Growing up in New Orleans, my mother always served a fancy brunch on Sundays, complete with French champagne. She’d splash a little orange juice in it sometimes, for color. Here.” He handed Barleigh a crystal glass, the brush of her finger against his setting his nerves on edge.
Barleigh sipped. “Mmm. Wonderful. New Orleans? Is that where you’re from? If you recall me saying last night, my grandfather spent time there.”
“I recall a lot about last night. À votre santé.” Hughes lifted his glass and sipped. “To your health.”
“À votre santé. Are you sure it doesn’t mean ‘let’s change the subject’?”
Hughes smiled at her. “I grew up in New Orleans. My father owns Lévesque Sugarcane and Shipping. He built Lévesque Plantation with the engineering plans from Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello home. Besides sugarcane, he raises thoroughbreds.”
“Tell me more, please.” Barleigh sipped her champagne.
“Yes, ma’am,” said Hughes, refilling their glasses. “Actually, the horses are my mother’s doing. Father allows her to raise them. I have a twin brother, John-Pierre, who’s taken over most duties with the businesses. I left New Orleans when I was eighteen or so—became a Texas Ranger. Now, I do certain jobs for the government that no one else will. That’s my story in a nutshell. Now, may we call a truce for the day? You seem angry with me.”
“I’m not angry. I’m nervous that if my secret gets found out and I lose this job—”
“Then what? What’s the worst that could happen?” He handed her a plate. “Sorry, the food is a little sparse.”
“Thank you.” She nibbled on a small piece of smoked bacon. “The worst? I go back to Texas without enough money to pay the taxes on my ranch. Then the bank forecloses and I lose the deed. I told you. I’m not dressing up and pretending to be a boy for the thrill of the masquerade. This is not a game I’m playing.”
“That poker stake you won last night isn’t enough? How’s that cut on your head, by the way?” He reached out to touch it but Barleigh drew back.
“It’s fine, thanks,” she said, pulling away from his touch. “The money helps a great deal, but no, not enough.”
“How much are the taxes? I’ll give you the rest of the money.” Hughes shifted on the blanket and refilled the champagne glasses.
“Why? Because you’re a wealthy plantation owner? How many slaves does it take to run a sugarcane and thoroughbred plantation? Do your slaves work at your shipping yards, too?” She downed the remainder of the champagne in one gulp, coughing at the stinging in her throat as it went down.
Hughes leaned back on his elbows, biting his tongue, trying to keep his anger in check. “My father is the owner of Lévesque Sugarcane and Shipping. Don’t judge me based on what you think you know.”
He settled a steady gaze on her, clenching and unclenching his jaw at the memory of his father shoving a pocketful of money at him—telling him not to come back. He’d learned more of how to be a man from Okwara, the plantation slave, than from his father.
“I was wrong to judge. The idea of you giving me money that was earned off the backs of slaves set me off. Please forgive me.”
“Forgiven and forgotten. But boy, you sure can go from a friendship truce to firing with both barrels in the flash of an eye.”
“My father said my fiery temper was a gift from my mother. I wouldn’t know, firsthand. She died when I was born.”
Barleigh shrugged her shoulders.
“I’m sorry.” Hughes drew in a deep breath, then let it out slowly.
“Besides the taxes, there’s also the matter of rebuilding the house, the barn. Animals to replace. . . .” Barleigh shuddered, started to say something more, and then looked away.
Laying on the picnic blanket watching her, Hughes tried to follow her gaze but it led to nowhere in particular that he could discern. Hearing her speak those words, saying that her mother died in childbirth, made him sick to his stomach. His jaw clinched, his eyes darkened, but he wouldn’t allow her to see his reaction—he was well versed in the art of secrecy.
He waited in patient silence for her to gather her thoughts, hoping she would let down a little of the wall she’d built between them—the barrier she’d fashioned between her and the rest of the world.
She looked back at him, her brow furrowed, and said in such a soft voice that he had to sit up and lean forward to hear. “A midnight Indian raid. . . . The night of the Comanche moon. Birdie, Papa, and Uncle Jack, all were killed. Aunt Winnie and I hid in the goat shed down in the cellar with my new baby sister, Starling. That night, the moon was so big—so bright. Beautiful, yet terrifying. It spotlighted a swarm of Comanche up on the Brazos River ridge. I saw them just as clearly as I knew they saw us.”
Hughes put his hands on her arms, turning her more to face him. “That night, what else do you remember?”
“I remember Papa being worried about the worsening skirmishes between the Reservation Indians and the settlers in the area. But Papa said it wasn’t the Reservation Indians doing the attacking.” Barleigh’s voice quivered.
“Who did he say it was?” asked Hughes.
“He said it was either white men doing it and blaming it on the Reservation Indians, or it was Quanah Parker’s band of Comanche. There had been reports of Quanah raiding in the area, according to Papa’s friend, Captain Goodnight. You might know Charlie Goodnight. He’s a Texas Ranger, too.”
“He’s a friend.” Cold sweat beaded on Hughes’s forehead and his gut tightened. He sat his plate on the blanket and stood, taking off his hat, running his hands through his hair.
But Quanah Parker was in San Antonio. Could he have traveled that far in a day or two? A Comanche on horseback riding hard can cover 250 miles or more in twenty-four hours, stealing fresh mounts along the way. It was possible. . . .
“What are you thinking? You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Barleigh said.
“I’m trying to figure out if Quanah Parker could have been in—” Hughes stopped himself, trying to remember if Barleigh had shared with him where she was from, or if he was remembering it from his tracking her down.
“Been in what?”
“When, exactly, was the raid on your ranch? The date? And, did you tell me where in Texas you lived?”
“The raid happened Friday, September the twenty-seventh. Just after midnight. And, no, I haven’t told you where I’m from. My land is in Palo Pinto, a half day’s ride west of Fort Worth on the Brazos River.”
“When you saw the mounted warriors on the ridge, could you make them out clearly? Could you see if there seemed to be a leader, or chief, and if so, what color was his horse?” Hughes drilled his questions, his words coming rapid-fire.
“There were so many, well over a hundred. I’m certain there was a leader who gave the signal to attack. I don’t recall the color of his horse. White, maybe?”
Hughes paced back and forth, then walked to where the horses stood tied. He rested his forehead against his mare’s neck, breathing in the woodsy, familiar smell of a sweaty horse. That smell always took him back to his first memory. It was the smell of his childhood and the hours he spent racing his pony through the mossy woods of his home.
“Damn it to hell,” he said, his booming voice and his fists pounding against the saddle, causing his horse to nicker and shy away.
The words of the obese blackjack dealer in San Antonio, Jerry Allsup, rang in his head: “Mark my words, but you’ll regret not killing that son of a bitch while you had the chance.”And he was right. Hughes regretted not having killed Quanah Parker, even if his warriors would have filled him with their arrows.
“Hughes?”
He turned and saw her looking at him with fear and concern in her cat-like eyes that looked like Leighselle’s, except Barleigh’s were blue, not green. The tilt of her head, the slope of her nose, the point of her chin, her fine cheekbones, her gracefulness even while dressed like a boy, gripped his heart.
“You look so much like . . .” He ran a hand down his face, shutting off the thought.
“I look so much like what?” she asked, standing, moving cautiously closer.
“Nothing, Barleigh. You remind me of someone I know. End of story. We better go. I have a long ride tomorrow.”
He began rolling the plates and glasses together in the blanket, tossing the food aside, throwing out the rest of the champagne. One of the crystal glasses banged against a plate and splintered into a spider’s web of cracks.
“Goddamnit.” He threw the broken glass against a rock. Then, picking up the other glass, he threw it, too, sending shards of fine, leaded German crystal flying into the air.
Barleigh placed a gentling hand on his arm. “Hey. Hey. Easy. Let me help you with putting these things away. What’s wrong?”
Hughes shrugged off her hand. “No. Don’t. Just. . . . Please get on your horse. I’m in a hurry.”
There was a letter to write. He would beg Leighselle to stop this damned lie—he couldn’t do it anymore. If Barleigh knew that she had a mother—that her mother had paid the taxes on her land—Barleigh would go home and would stop this foolish, dangerous masquerade she was playing.
“Hughes, what have I done? What’s wrong?” Barleigh followed him as he slung his saddlebag over the cantle, tying it in place with the leather latigo. “Look at me. What have I done?” She stood close behind him, waiting for an answer.
Turning around, Hughes looked down and into her eyes, which were the color of the sky. He reached out his hand, stroked her cheek, rubbing his thumb across a smudge of dirt. Then, lifting her bangs, he checked on her cut forehead, tracing around the bandage with his finger.
“I don’t know how in the world you have everyone fooled into thinking you’re a boy. You’re so pretty. So very pretty,” he said, a sad tone to his voice.
“People believe what they want to believe, or what they’re told to believe. What have I done to anger you? Something’s changed.”
“You’ve done nothing. I’ve just come to the conclusion that you’ve been right all along. I should’ve never kissed you. I don’t have the time or the luxury to worry about you,” he said, a firm set to his jaw.
“The luxury? I didn’t ask you to worry about me. You appointed yourself to that role. You don’t have to speak to me in such a rude fashion. You don’t have to speak to me at all, as far as I’m concerned. What I’m trying to accomplish would have far fewer risks if you and I never crossed paths again.” She crossed her arms against her chest.
“Be careful what you ask for.” He turned and swung into the saddle, guiding his mare up the steep grade and away from the cave.
The ride back into town was even more silent than the ride out. Hughes rode ahead of Barleigh, keeping his mare at a fast trot. Each time she caught up with him, he would speed up just enough to make it obvious that he didn’t want to ride side by side.
*****
Barleigh reined her gelding to a stop at the end of the road and watched as Hughes led his mare into the barn, he not once looking back to see if she was behind. She had wanted him to leave her alone. She had pushed him away—told him to never kiss her again, to never speak to her again. So why did she feel like her heart was shattering like the crystal glasses he’d smashed against the boulders?
Minutes later, she watched as he left carrying his saddlebags in one hand, something clutched in the other, and headed for the Salt Lake House acro
ss the street. Barleigh squeezed her heels and clucked, “Come on, boy, walk on.” The gelding complied, responding to the gentle cue.
“Mr. Lévesque was sure in a foul mood,” said Big Brody as he swept the center aisle of the barn. “Didn’t say nothing to me. He scribbled a quick message for the Carson City mail, asked Mario to have Carson City telegraph it to San Antonio, then he grabbed a bottle of whiskey and left.”
So that’s what he was carrying.
“I can’t say. We rode together for a while, then he took off on his own. Said something about a big job tomorrow.” Barleigh finished currying the gelding and put him in his stall with a fresh pail of water and scoop of oats. “Stoney already gone?”
“He rode out a few seconds ago. That’s his dust hanging on the wind.” Big Brody nodded over his shoulder toward the wide, double doors that were slid open, allowing fresh air into the barn.
Barleigh peered down the road but Stoney was out of sight. “A bit late leaving, wasn’t he?”
“Mail was late coming in. Some problem back down the line, don’t know what for sure. Say, just so you know. . . .” Big Brody lowered his voice. “Mario ordered me to take that Mexican sombrero of his and burn it. Today. You might want to hide it someplace.”
“Mario can go to hell,” said Barleigh, giving Brody a thank you nod. A good spit on the ground was called for.
“I’ve been to hell,” said Mario, walking in the door, slapping Barleigh on the back. “Hell’s living for eighty-seven days in the steerage of a cargo ship and fighting over who gets the fattest rat for your one meal of the day. It’s seeing your mother and father’s bodies tossed overboard along with the rest of the stinking trash. Hell’s being ten years old and alone in New York City, someone stealing your shoes off your feet while you slept, waking up hungry, picking through horse shit with your bare hands, searching for the undigested oats. That’s my version of hell.”
