"You can't ride John Henry," Zac called out. "That's one of Monty's horses." Zac bumped his head as he jumped up from where he had been dozing under the chuckwagon. He erupted with a stream of curses.
Iris backed away from the horse like she expected it to attack her. She caught up a zebra dun. It was too ugly and small to belong to any of the Randolphs. Taking a firm hold of the mane, she pulled herself onto his back. Turning the horse toward the rope, Iris kicked it in the ribs. The horse shot forward, jumped the low-slung rope, and headed toward the open prairie at a gallop.
"Come back here!" Zac shouted.
"Where is Iris going?" Betty Crane asked.
"I don't know," Zac said, "but I tried to stop her. You've got to tell Monty I tried to stop her."
"Why?"
"He'll skin me alive for letting her go off like that. He's crazy in love with her."
"I didn't realize that," Betty said.
"Neither does Monty," Tyler said, looking after Iris, his usually expressionless face furrowed with worry. "And neither does Iris."
* * * * *
Monty was feeling good. They were only two days out of Dodge. The hardest part of the journey was over. He had paid off the Comanches and sent them back to their people with enough beef to get them through the winter. Because of Dodge's reputation as a lawless town, he was planning to pass about ten miles to the west, so he had sent Hen and Salty ahead to hire some new hands and buy enough supplies to take them to Ogalalla.
But that wasn't the real reason he was feeling so good.
His indecision was past. He had decided he had been stupid to stay away from Iris. That was no way to solve anything. He had a feeling he might be in love with her. While the idea scared him practically to death, it excited him as well. He didn't know what he wanted out of life, but he knew he wanted it to include Iris. He couldn't wait to tell her.
"She didn't say where she was going?" Monty asked. He had been surprised to find Iris away from camp. He had warned her over and over again of the danger of going anywhere alone.
"Nope," Zac replied, being careful to keep a safe distance between himself and his brother.
"That's not like her."
"I can't help that. She just threw herself on that zebra dun and lit out of here like a panther was after her."
"Do you have any idea where she was going?" Monty asked, turning to Betty Crane.
"No. She appeared to be upset about something, but she didn't say anything to me."
"Do you know?" Monty asked Tyler.
"It wasn't Hen," Tyler said. "He wouldn't do that."
"I know." No matter what Hen said to Monty about Iris, he would never utter a word to anybody else.
"There might be Indians out there," Betty asked, obviously worried. "I came from that direction."
"We've left Indian territory. How long has she been gone?"
"Not long," Zac said.
"About half an hour," Tyler corrected.
Monty looked uneasy. "If she doesn't show up by noon, I'll have to go after her."
Everybody stared at him.
"You can't go," Zac said, looking at Monty like he was crazy. "There's nobody to be in charge except you."
"Well we can't just leave her out there," Monty said. "Knowing Iris, if she headed for Dodge, she'd end up in Indian territory."
"I imagine she'll turn up soon," Tyler said. "She might have a poor sense of direction, but she's a right sensible girl."
"You better see somebody about eyeglasses the minute we get to Denver," Zac told Tyler.
"I don't need glasses," Tyler said.
"You do if you're thinking Iris looks like a girl."
* * * * *
Monty made no attempt to hide his ill-temper. He paced back and forth between the campfire and the remuda. Every minute or so he would erupt with a string of curses, break, smash, or throw something, then start pacing more furiously than ever. Tyler ignored him. Betty watched him with trepidation. Zac kept as far away from him as possible. No one spoke to him.
He was in a quandary for which he could find no satisfactory answer. He had to go after Iris. But if he did, he would have to abandon his responsibility for the herd. There was no possible way he could do both.
He couldn't wait long enough to send someone to Dodge to bring Hen and Salty back. There was no one else with any experience heading up a drive. At this moment he would even have welcomed Frank back.
That just shows how desperate you are. Hen said you'd ruin yourself over this woman. Why don't you send somebody else? Why not Carlos?
But he couldn't remain in camp not knowing what might be happening. It could be several days before anybody found her.
What could have made her run away? Iris had a volatile temper, but she didn't do stupid things. She knew how dangerous it was out there. All the more reason for Monty to worry. Whatever was wrong was serious.
Which brought him back to his initial problem. He had to go after her now, but he couldn't do so without leaving the herd virtually unattended. Monty uttered another string of curses and walked a little faster.
Then he stopped in his tracks. There was no decision to be made. He had known from the beginning he was going after Iris, so why was he wasting his time over a decision that was already made when he ought to be thinking about what to do next?
Monty felt a great weight fall away. Then he remembered something he once heard Rose say and felt even better. Any man can do a good job when the answers are easy. It's how he does when there are none but hard decisions that measures him. Well this was a hard decision, probably the hardest of his life, but he'd made the only decision he could. If he could live with it, everybody else would have to as well.
Monty felt like his old self again. He set off to tell Tyler he had been promoted from cook to drover.
"But I don't want to be in charge," Tyler protested. "I came along to cook, not ramrod this drive."
"Let me," Zac pleaded. "I can do it."
"Carlos will help you," Monty said, ignoring Zac. "According to Iris, about a quarter of the herd will soon be his."
Several gazes turned to Carlos, new interest and curiosity in them. Tyler ignored Carlos and gave his brother a hard look. "You've got no business doing this, and you know it."
"Carlos ought to be in charge," Joe said.
"This is a Randolph drive," Monty said, leveling Joe with a steady, unnerving gaze. "And nobody ramrods a Randolph drive but a Randolph."
"Even if he's the cook?" Betty looked skeptical.
Monty turned to Betty. "Don't let Tyler fool you. He may look like a monk, but he's tough as shoe leather."
"What about me?" Zac asked.
"You're as hardheaded as a dried oak stump, but you might turn out okay yet. You got that food ready?" Monty asked, turning back to Tyler. His brother handed him the bulging saddle bags. "What did you pack?"
"Beans and bacon," Tyler said. "Even you can cook that."
"I'd better hope so," Monty said, with a quick grin. "Iris sure can't."
"Are you sure you can't wait until Hen and Salty get back?"
"Even if I sent someone now, it would be past midnight before Hen could get back. I can't leave Iris alone out there at night."
"You could send one of the men," Betty suggested.
"I ought to be the one going after her," Carlos said. "She's my sister."
"Yeah, he ought to go," Joe agreed. "I can handle the herd for him."
Monty faced the two men. Much to his own surprise, he didn't experience the wave of anger that usually swept over him when his actions were questioned. Neither did he feel his usual irritation that Iris had saddled him with two men he neither respected nor trusted. He had found himself faced with a difficult situation. He had thought it through and made the only decision he could make. Everyone else would just have to accept it.
"I'm going after Iris, and Tyler's in charge here. Anyone who doesn't like that arrangement had better saddle up and ride out ahead of me. That
okay with you, Carlos?"
"I guess, but I don't like it."
Monty didn't waste time on Joe. "I'll hold you responsible for your friend," he told Carlos as he swung into the saddle. He was riding Nightmare. "I don't know when I'll get back. Hen and Salty ought to be back by tomorrow afternoon. If I'm lucky, I'll be back before them."
"What if you don't find her?" Betty asked.
Monty hadn't let himself think of that question. It was a possibility he couldn't accept. "I'll keep looking until I do."
Monty hadn't been gone five minutes when he heard a horse galloping hard behind him. He turned to see Carlos coming toward him. Puzzled, he pulled up and waited.
"I found out why Iris ran away," Carlos said as soon as he pulled alongside Monty.
"Why didn't you tell me before?" Monty asked, irritated Carlos should have waited so long.
"I didn't know then."
"Know what?"
"Joe told Iris about her father. Her real father."
Anger swept over Monty with the speed of the north wind, but it wasn't a hot anger. It was cold and deadly. He resisted the temptation to ride back and beat Joe Reardon until he begged for mercy. He had to find Iris. In her state she might do anything.
"Thanks," Monty said. "Now you'd better get back. I know Reardon is your friend, but you can tell him that if he's still around when I get back, he'll answer to me for this."
"Joe didn't mean--"
"You can also tell him I don't intend to accept his reasons, no matter what they are."
Monty turned and rode off, a new urgency riding with him. He didn't know all the crazy ideas Helena had tried to teach Iris, but he would have bet his herd she had drummed into Iris's head the importance of family and birth and position in society. Learning she was the bastard daughter of common clerk could make Iris desperate enough to do just about anything.
* * * * *
Monty found her a half an hour after dusk. She was riding along the crest of a ridge, silhouetted against the sky, perfectly visible to anyone within miles, friend, outlaw, or Indian.
After spending the whole afternoon worrying about her, Monty's nerves were stretched taut, his stomach balled in a hard knot. He had endured eight horrible hours of imagining nearly every awful thing that could happen to her, from a rattlesnake bite to being thrown from her horse and unable to move because of a broken leg. His relief was nearly physical. So was the rush of anger that she should have done anything so incredibly dangerous.
Iris seemed to be retracing her path through the grass. She was concentrating so hard she didn't see him coming until he was about fifty yards away. When she turned, she seemed not to recognize him for a moment. Then with a cry, she drove her horse down the rise and across the prairie.
Damn! What did she mean by running from him? Didn't she know he had come to help? Nightmare's long, powerful strides ate up the distance between them with incredible swiftness.
"Go away! Leave me alone!" Iris cried when Monty came alongside.
Monty reached out and grasped her horse's bridle. He brought them both to such an abrupt stop Iris nearly fell off. She fought to wrench the reins out of his hand. When Monty proved too strong, she slid off her horse and started running through the waist-high grass. Riding after her, Monty came alongside, bent low from the saddle, and slipping his arms around her waist, lifted her off the ground.
"Put me down and go away! I don't want to talk to you!" Iris kicked and hit him with her fists, but she couldn't break his hold on her.
"Stop it, dammit!" Monty grunted, his teeth clenched from the physical effort of holding her off the ground. With a mighty heave of powerful muscles, he hoisted Iris into the saddle before him. "We're going to talk, but I can't very well do it with you dashing across the hillside."
"You can't want to have anything to say to the bastard daughter of a blackmailer," Iris sobbed. Her struggles ceased and she collapsed against his chest. "Randolphs don't associate with people like that."
"That just shows how little you know about me," Monty said. His arms tightened around Iris. "I like beautiful redheads no matter what."
"You can't like me. Not knowing who my father was."
Monty made a noise that sounded like a cross between a snort of contempt and an embittered laugh. "My father turned vicious when he got drunk, gambled away the family fortune, seduced I don't know how many women, killed at least one man in a duel, and is rumored to have stolen a half million-dollar payroll during the War. Compared to him, your father was up to no more than Sunday afternoon pranks."
"Did he really kill somebody?" Iris asked, her tears momentarily stopped.
"He seduced his best friend's sister then forced a duel on him."
"But you're not illegitimate."
"I would rather be the bastard son of an honest cowhand than the spawn of that sonofabitch. Where do you think I get my hellish temper? Or Hen his readiness to kill. That man's foul blood is in us all."
Iris desperately wanted to believe Monty, but what about the rest? "That wasn't all Joe told me."
Monty pulled Nightmare to a halt. "What else did he say?"
"It was about my mother. And George."
Monty sighed as though he knew he was getting into more trouble by talking than by keeping quiet. "I guess you'll have to know sooner or later."
"Then it's true."
"I don't know. Depends on what Joe told you."
"That my mother made a play for George. That you killed my father."
Monty started back toward Iris's horse which was grazing a hundred yards away. "Damn! The bastard didn't leave anything out, did he?"
Oh God, it was true! She had hoped it wasn't. All day she'd tried to think of some reason Joe would have lied to her. But he hadn't. Monty's reaction proved it.
Monty sighed again. "A couple of years ago, I sort of developed a crush on Helena," he began. "Not that there was anything unusual in that. Practically every man who set eyes on Helena fell in love with on her the spot."
Iris had a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach. How could she love a man who'd been in love with her mother? "Did you fall in love with her?"
"Good God, no!" Monty exclaimed, startled. "I probably would have forgotten her in a month if everybody hadn't kept saying there must be something wrong with me when I couldn't think of anything to say to a beautiful woman that didn't have to do with cows."
Iris experienced an enormous feeling of relief. She had never expected she would be the only woman Monty had ever loved, but she couldn't have stood it if the other woman had been her mother.
"But Helena wanted me to talk about cows. She asked me all kinds of questions about the ranch and George and Rose. Fool that I was, I didn't see what she was after."
"What was that?"
"Helena knew long before everybody else that your father was getting short of money. She was looking for her next husband, and she had set her sights on George."
Iris felt her face flame with mortification. Marrying Robert Richmond to give her child a name was one thing. Attempting to break up a happy marriage so she could marry a rich man was quite another.
Iris's horse had his head buried in the tall grass when they came up to him. Monty hooted, and the startled animal threw up his head. Monty caught hold of the reins. He tied them to the saddle and continued on.
"Rose has always wanted a house full of children, so she was delighted a couple years ago when she found she was expecting a baby. But right from the first everything seemed to go wrong. She was sick a lot. The baby came too early and died. Rose had a very difficult time getting over it. Took her nearly a year. She never was as pretty as Helena, but she was real worn down for quite some time. I guess Helena thought George would be easy prey what with Rose so sick and peaked looking."
Iris wondered if there was anything else her parents could do to make her feel still more worthless and misbegotten.
"Helena used to come over to the house pretending to be worried about Rose, but s
he was really making up to George. It didn't do her any good. George never could see anybody but Rose, but Helena said some things that hurt Rose. I came in one day and found her crying. I was so all-fired mad I could have singed the hair off Helena's head. I went to her house and told her if she ever said anything else to make Rose cry, I was going to tell Robert what she was doing.
"I was fool enough to think she would be embarrassed at being caught and that would be the end of it. The words were hardly out of my mouth when she started screaming like she was being attacked by Apaches. The whole household came running. She told Robert I had tried to make love to her, right there in the front parlor, mind you, and the poor fool believed her. He marched me out of the house at the end of a shotgun. Told me if I ever came back he'd fill me full of buckshot."
"What happened then?"
"Nothing. I never went back and Rose got better."
"What about my father?"
Monty regarded Iris uneasily. "I never knew your father. When I ran into him in Mexico, he was just a stranger trying to pick a fight. I shouldn't have hit him so hard, but he said some terrible things about George and Rose. I left Mexico two days later. That same day he was killed in a knife fight. Helena liked to tell people I was so crazy in love with her I had killed him for her. Some people still believe it."
Iris cringed at the memory of having once accused Monty of killing a man in a fight. It seemed that everything she ever said to him had taken on a new and unsuspectedly cruel meaning.
"Now I understand why you disliked me for such a long time."
"I never dislike you." Monty's reserve fell away. He was once again a man eager to convince a woman of his feelings for her.
"Then why did you walk out on me that night at the party?"
The uneasiness came back. His gaze slid away from direct contact. "I was afraid you'd be like your mother. You looked so much like her."
Iris looked at him with a blank stare.
"The only Iris I knew was a tomboy who followed me about getting in the way all the time. I couldn't identify her with the femme fatale I saw that evening."
Iris Page 27
