The Blackbird

by Kristy McCaffrey

  “Thank you.” Mary took the folded paper.

  Tom came and put an arm around her. “You alright?”

  Mary nodded and smiled.

  “Let me put Evie down so you can take your time with the news,” Tess offered.

  Mary hesitated, then silently agreed. Tess brushed past Cale and he caught her scent, rosemary kissed with sunlight. She took Evie with her free arm while using the cane with her left hand. She soon disappeared through another doorway.

  Tom kissed Mary on the cheek. “Take your time.”

  Staring at the paper, she left them.

  Tom looked at Cale. “This’ll give us a chance to talk. Robbie, please watch your sister in the courtyard.”

  “Yes, sir.” Little Robbie took Molly Rose’s hand, and they moved to a dirt pile off to the side covered with wooden toys.

  Cale followed Tom back into the kitchen. “Coffee?” Tom asked.

  “Appreciate it.”

  Tom took the kettle from the stove and poured steaming fluid into two tin cups.

  “It’s nice to finally meet you,” Tom said. “Mary thinks highly of you.”

  “I’m glad to see she’s done well.”

  The look on Tom’s face told Cale that he understood the statement. The Hart girls—Mary, Molly and Emma—had endured more heartbreak than they deserved after losing their folks. When Matt Ryan married Molly, it fell to others to look after the sisters.

  Cale had ridden to Fort Sumner with Nathan Blackmore and Logan Ryan. Nathan—a Texas Ranger—then headed to Grand Canyon in search of Emma, who’d run off from San Francisco. Logan departed to Las Vegas, in the New Mexico Territory, to check on Molly’s friend, Claire. And Cale came here, to not only deliver Molly’s letter, but to help Tess Carlisle at Mary’s behest.

  “We should talk about Hank Carlisle,” Tom said without preamble.

  “You know where he’s at?”

  “Not exactly, but I may have a lead. I’ve never told Tess. She’s determined to find him and would run off on her own. Mary convinced her to wait for you. I know Hank, and I know the kind of men he hung around with. I don’t think Tess should go anywhere near it.”

  “I agree. Why did he leave her here?”

  Tom hesitated, taking a swig of coffee. “Two years ago, he showed up with Tess.” He stared into his cup for a moment. “She was in bad shape.”

  “What happened to her?”

  Tom gave a slight shake of his head. “I don’t know. Tess would never say. She’s spoken of it a little to Mary, but not much. She was beat up pretty bad, and there was a bullet in her leg. Whoever did it had been…thorough. Thankfully, she didn’t get with child.

  “Hank asked me to look out for her and to keep it low profile, and then he left. Haven’t seen him since, although in the first few months he sent money. But he never said where he was. I haven’t heard anything from him in over a year. Maybe the sonofabitch is dead. I don’t know. I wonder if he went after the man who’d done it. Knowing Hank, he would’ve killed him ten times over.”

  Cale agreed. Hank Carlisle was ruthless. He’d seen it firsthand. In the end, it was one of the reasons Cale had distanced himself from his mentor. That, and Saul Miller.

  “What do you know?” Cale asked.

  “About six weeks ago, I overheard a supplier in town talking about a small anvil that he’d shipped to Tubac, to a person named Henry Worthington. I caught a glance at the order and saw another name—Carleton Perry. When money came for Tess, it wasn’t from Hank, but from Perry, so I’m assuming it’s him.”

  “You’d be right,” Cale said quietly. Hank had sometimes used Carleton Perry as an alias.

  “I’m grateful you’ve come. I’d go after Hank myself, but I won’t leave Mary and the children alone.”

  “Have you had problems with the Apache?”

  “No. To hear all the blathering in Tucson, you’d think we were overrun with ’em. The truth is, there’s some local businessmen who like to fill the territorial papers with exaggerations and sometimes outright lies. It makes a good case for a large military presence, which leads to more customers for their goods. But with Geronimo currently locked up at San Carlos, tensions have seemed to ease a bit.”

  Cale understood. “How’s it goin’ out here with the ranching?”

  “I’m hanging on. Fort Lowell buys most of the beef. There’s no denying we all benefit from the military. But, truth is, I’ve decided to sell the place and move to town. I already have an offer, and I’ve got a chance to buy into a flour mill. I can give Mary a nicer home, and Robbie will be able to attend school. Mary won’t say so, but I think she gets lonely out here. Having Tess has been more of a blessing than we could’ve imagined.

  “Look, I never knew Hank well,” Tom continued. “Mary befriended Isabelle, Tess’s madre, several years ago, and we all crossed paths as time passed. I liked Hank, despite his lack of commitment to his family. But be careful. Whatever happened to Tess could lead to more trouble.”

  “I understand,” Cale said. “If Hank’s alive, I’ll find him. I’ll leave at first light tomorrow, before Tess is awake.”

  “She won’t be happy to be left behind.”

  “Sounds like Hank.”

  Tom laughed. “She’s definitely his daughter.”

  Chapter Two

  Tess hung her head and left her spot near the open doorway of the kitchen. She hadn’t meant to eavesdrop. She’d put Evie to sleep more quickly than usual and thought to return to clean the lunch dishes, but when she realized that Tom and Cale were speaking of Hank, she’d hesitated before entering.

  Tess hadn’t known many good men, but Tom Simms was strong, honest, and devoted to his wife and children . She thought highly of him, a sentiment she felt for few people, least of all for the males of the species.

  But Tom had known things about her padre and hadn’t shared the news with her. Even he wasn’t forthright when given a reason. He no doubt thought he protected her, but she had a right to make her own choices. It wasn’t as if she had any family left to worry about her.

  Robbie and Molly Rose came to mind , and while she loved them more than she ever thought possible, they weren’t her kin. After losing her madre and abuela, she hadn’t imagined anything more heartbreaking could befall her. But then there’d been Saul Miller. She set her jaw, and willed the man from her thoughts. He didn’t deserve it.

  As she carefully leaned on her cane and crept back to her room at the far end of the adobe dwelling, her hand clasped the silver cross hanging around her neck. It was the only memento—besides a legacy of storytelling—that she had of her beloved abuela.

  She needed to leave in the morning, whether Señor Walker liked it or not.

  Cale wasn’t what she expected . She’d only seen him once when she was twelve, from a distance. He’d been young then, but still, she’d imagined him to be older, like Hank.

  Tess entered her room and set about packing a satchel with clothing, frustration welling up inside.

  Cale didn’t match the stories she knew of him, tales that she often shared with Robbie and Molly Rose. He was tall and fair-haired, his short hair appearing darker or lighter depending on whether he stood in the shadows or the sunlight. She found it hard to comprehend that he was a medicine man with the Apache. Shouldn’t he be more solemn, more spiritual, more holy-looking?

  She would ask him, but her natural distaste for all things men held her tongue. She wadded up her clothes, not caring if they wrinkled, and jammed them into the bag. If Esteban only knew how much he disgusted her, he would’ve surely given up courting her long ago. She was damaged goods anyway. Esteban didn’t really want her. He desired her because she always said no.

  She paused and took a fortifying breath to clear her head.

  She’d have to take the new gelding, Gideon, since she didn’t know how far she needed to travel. If she told Tom and Mary, they’d insist she not go for her own safety. She would have to leave them a note, promising to return the hors
e at some later point. She also wouldn’t be able to say goodbye to Robbie or Molly Rose; they’d surely tell their folks. Pain tightened her throat and tears threatened. She wished she could explain it to them. But she’d return once she found Hank, once she set things right between them.

  She added a blanket, hairbrush and mirror, then buckled the bag and hid it. Tonight she'd take food from the kitchen and fill a saddlebag from the tack room in the barn, along with several canteens of water. She sat at the desk in the corner to write a letter to Tom and Mary and glanced at the nearby stack of books. A pang of longing went through her—she wanted to take them, but knew she couldn’t. They’d be too cumbersome. But to be without her stories was almost as bad as no food or water. They literally fed her soul, even more so in the last two years as she struggled to find herself again after the incident.

  Maybe she could take one book with her. Her eyes landed on Tennyson.

  Hank’s Irish brogue whispered in her ears.

  O blackbird! sing me something well.

  “Papá,” she whispered. “Why?”

  The question hung in the air, as it had so many times before.

  * * * *

  As Tess helped Mary prepare dinner, the other woman was unusually quiet. Tess suspected it had something to do with the letter Señor Walker had given her. The discovery that her sister, Molly, was alive after having been thought dead all these years had filled Mary with elation, followed by tremendous guilt for not having done something.

  “Was it a good letter from your hermana?” Tess asked.

  Mary hesitated. “It answered a lot of questions.” She pursed her lips. “It would seem I’m related to Cale now.”

  “You are?” Tess asked in surprise.

  “Of a sort. My ma had a relationship with Cale’s pa some time ago, and he fathered Molly. So she’s Cale’s half-sister.”

  As Tess thought about this turn of events, she realized it might be an unwelcome revelation. “I’m so sorry, Mary. What about Emma?” she asked, referring to Mary’s youngest sister. “Is she Cale’s sister too?”

  “No. It would seem it’s just Molly. She also said they discovered who murdered my folks, a man who had worked for my pa. He'd tried to force himself on Emma, who was only eight years old at the time. Molly caught him, then lied to our pa about it, saying the man had attacked her.”

  Tess went cold. She knew all too well of what Mary spoke.

  “So this man,” Mary continued, “returned to our ranch and attacked us, killing my folks. He took Molly in retaliation, but they were overtaken by Comanche, who then took her themselves. There’d been another girl already with the Indians, and she was the one they killed, the one we all mistook for Molly. It’s just so unbelievable.”

  “Sí,” Tess said. “Once Evie is bigger, you can go to Texas and see Molly. You can introduce Molly Rose to her namesake.”

  Mary relaxed slightly. “Yes. I so look forward to it. I just wish Emma would answer my letter. I wonder if she knows yet.”

  They called the men and children to the table. Señor Walker filled the space beside her. They spooned boiled potatoes, peppers, and steak onto their plates.

  “So, tell me about Molly,” Mary said to Cale.

  “She hasn’t changed much. She still enjoys running around outside as much as she ever did.”

  “She said in her letter that she married Matt Ryan.” Mary laughed. “I never would’ve thought of the two of them together.”

  “Well, he hovered over her like a hawk. I doubt any of us could’ve pried them apart. I know she was sorry to marry without you or Emma present.”

  Mary’s gaze shifted to Tom. “I understand.”

  “She probably couldn’t wait any more than you could,” Tom said with a wink.

  Mary blushed, and Tess suppressed a smile.

  “Time was of the essence,” Mary said to Cale.

  Tess didn’t miss the look Cale gave to Tom. “It’s a good thing you did right by her,” he said.

  “I always intended to.” He glanced at his wife, and Tess felt, as she often did, the strong current of love that ran between them. Despite what had happened, despite the bad taste men in general gave her, Tom and Mary’s relationship offered a sliver of hope of what could really lay between a man and a woman.

  Mary pulled her affectionate gaze from her husband and turned her attention to Cale. “Tell us what you’ve been up to these past ten years. When Emma and I moved to San Francisco, we heard that you joined the army.”

  “Yeah, that’s right. I was stationed at Camp Bowie.”

  “Did you fight Apache?” Tess asked.

  “Some.”

  “But you lived with them as well. Hank told me the stories about you.”

  “Are they true?” Mary asked.

  Cale paused with his fork hovering over his plate, his gaze shifting from one woman to the other. “I’m not sure what you’ve heard, but yes, I did live with a tribe of Nednai for a time after an attack by a mountain lion.”

  “Why did that lion attack you?” Robbie blurted, wide-eyed and practically bouncing on the bench. “Did he try to eat you?”

  “Well, I don’t think he wanted to eat me. Sometimes animals get spooked and act a little crazy. I think maybe that’s what happened with this one. I was lucky the Apache found me. They scared him off, then helped me to recover.”

  “Did you become a doktur?” Molly Rose asked.

  Cale smiled and Tess chanced a glance at him. “I think your Aunt Tess has already told you this story.” She looked away as her face heated. “She told you that I became a di-yin. And she was right. That’s an Apache medicine man.”

  “Why would they let you become one of them?” Mary asked.

  “The attack marked me. And in their belief system, I was gifted with a power. In a sense, it had nothing to do with being an Apache. It was an outward sign of an inward recognition by the spirit world. While I recovered, I was taught what that meant.”

  “Can you make it rain?” Robbie asked.

  “No. Medicine men have different types of medicine. Making rain isn’t one of mine.”

  “What kind of medicina do you have?” Tess asked.

  “It’s hard to explain. I guess the easiest explanation is that I can see connections.”

  “Huh?” Robbie frowned.

  “That’s alright,” Cale said. “Sometimes I say huh myself.”

  Tom pushed Robbie’s plate closer to the boy, then looked at Cale. “Do you still hunt bounties?”

  “Some. Of late, I’ve been up in Colorado, around Trinidad. Enjoyed the colder weather.”

  With that, they all laughed.

  Dinner was finished and the table cleared. They all went to the center of the courtyard where Tom made a small fire in a pit ringed with stones. Tess took a seat across from Señor Walker. Robbie and Molly Rose flanked him like a pair of kittens trying to get warm. Their shyness of the stranger had apparently worn off . Tom and Mary sat to her right, and Cabal took up residence to her left. She scratched his ears and leaned forward as he licked her face.

  “Maybe Tess will tell a story,” Mary said. “She comes from a line of women called cuentistas, or storytellers.” Then, in an almost reverential tone, she added, “Keepers of the Old Ways.”

  Tess searched her internal library for something suitable as Cale watched her expectantly. Often, she told the story that jumped into her head. Even if it didn’t seem right, she knew to trust the spirits to give her the one that she needed.

  “Tell the one about the green man,” Robbie said.

  Tess considered the request. It had been a favorite of Hank’s, and she’d learned it as a young girl from her padre. She’d always considered her storytelling skills to be special. Not only had she acquired a rich Mexican heritage from her abuela, but also tales from her Irish papá.

  “Alright,” she replied. “It’s called Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.” She paused to let everyone settle in. “On New Year’s Day, all of King Arthur
’s knights were gathered at Camelot, the famous castle where he lived. As they feasted and exchanged gifts, a giant green knight entered the hall and proposed a game. Anyone in the court could strike him down with one blow, as long as he could return the favor in one year and one day. Sir Gawain came forward and accepted the challenge. He was the youngest of King Arthur’s knights, as well as his nephew. In one stroke, Gawain severed the head of the Green Knight.”

  Tess smiled as Robbie nodded his head in excited agreement. Amusement crossed Señor Walker’s face. She returned her gaze to the fire, making certain she didn’t lose the magic. Her abuela had taught her that. A story wasn’t a story without spirit breathed into it.

  “Well, Gawain was certain the Green Knight was dead, but he wasn’t. The Knight picked up his head and reminded Sir Gawain to meet him in a year and a day at the Green Chapel. Then, he rode away.

  “Soon, the date approached, and Gawain set off to find this chapel. Along the way, he had many battles and adventures, and eventually came to a magnificent castle where he met the lord, a man named Bertilak. He also met Bertilak’s beautiful wife.”

  “What’s her name?” Robbie asked. “I can’t remember.”

  “Lady Bertilak.”

  “That’s easy to recall,” Mary said. Molly Rose crawled onto her lap.

  “When Sir Gawain tells Lord and Lady Bertilak that he has an appointment at the Green Chapel on New Year’s Day,” Tess continued, “the Lord laughs and tells Gawain that the chapel is nearby. He invites Gawain to stay at the castle until the appointed day arrives, and Gawain accepts. The next day, before Lord Bertilak leaves to going hunting, he proposes a bargain to Gawain—he’ll give him whatever he catches that day, if Gawain will give him whatever he acquires during the day.”

  Robbie giggled. “This is the silly part.”