Arizona Territory

by Dusty Richards

  Dry, sweet, but not too sweet. “Very good,” he said, and handed his glass back. Thank God for Marge. She’d taught him how to do wine tasting.

  The glasses were soon filled. Her man served her and Maria, and then the two men, and Chet last.

  They raised their glasses in a toast to her, then sipped the wine.

  She looked around. “This ranch is hardly a federale-style headquarters.”

  “We aren’t fancy. We simply enforce the law.”

  “Oh, I know that. Bandits in Mexico respect you and your men. But I expected a military base like the fort south of here.”

  “We are only a strike force and my men are all cowboys. No generalissimo is here. We are low key, because we can’t upset the county law enforcement. The judges in the territory are federal judges. We work for them.”

  “To your health.” She clinked her glass to his and crossed her legs, making herself comfortable on the bench. Behind her façade of regal appearance, there was a little vixen in this handsome woman. Her words betrayed very little accent.

  “They tell me you have a large ranch west of here?”

  “Very large. You want to ride over it?”

  She stopped. “You catch me off guard, señor.”

  “No, señora, call me Chet. And it was just an offer to show you the place.”

  Her composure returned. “Yes, Chet. I would love to see all of it—with you. But you are a busy man to do that.”

  “Those two would handle the packhorses and cooking. You’d have a tent to hide in and we’d see every inch of the Diablo Ranch in a week.”

  She chewed on her lower lip and smiled. “Now I am the one that is scared. You are really serious. How many more ranches do you have?”

  “Five more, maybe six.”

  “You don’t know how many you have?”

  “I can find them.”

  She laughed, then put her hand over her mouth. “How long do I have to answer you?”

  “However long you need. I know you didn’t come here to go on a long ranch inspection with a man who has a week’s beard on his face.”

  She shook her head. “I have not said no to you.”

  “Nor yes.”

  “No, not yet, anyway. I understand you have a great Barbarossa stallion. What do I have to pay for a golden son of his out of a great mare?”

  He just looked at her, poker faced. When he did not answer, she spoke again. “I think you are a horse trader of the toughest kind. I am talking about money. In dollars or pesos.” She leaned in close and with a shake of her head, whispered, “Not me.”

  “I have no price on them.”

  She quick-like scowled at him. “You sold some to a Don Baca, who I know well, in Sonora.”

  “I didn’t sell them to him. I swapped them for the return of the daughter of a good friend being held in Mexico.”

  “I am sorry. Baca said he bought them.”

  “He may have. Those two were with me.” He motioned to his men. “She got herself into the wrong place and was kidnapped. We couldn’t raise a force big enough to safely get her away, so I offered him the horses for her safe return.”

  Her dark eyes looked hard at him. “They were very high-priced horses then.”

  “What are horses worth when someone holds another human being against their will? Nothing.”

  “Yes, you are right.” She tilted her head to one side. “I expected a bigger, louder man, but I think you don’t need to be.” A flick of her red tongue swept her brown lips. “If I take that excursion, can I see those horses?”

  “No. I’m sorry. Not this trip with me. The horses are at Camp Verde. But you can see them anytime. My foreman can show them to you, if I’m not up there.”

  “I know the Barbarossa family does not sell any stallions. How did you ever get such an animal?”

  “A young boy had a fast mare in Texas. He took her to Mexico and challenged the family to a race against their best horses. If he won, they bred his mare. If he lost, he lost the mare. He won the race and the mare had a horse colt. But they weren’t rich ranchers, so they sold him to me.”

  “Did the family ever offer to buy him back from you?”

  “He’s not for sale.”

  She poured him more wine. “I would like to sponsor a fiesta here for tonight, to celebrate our acquaintance. Does that suit you?”

  “Fine. What can I do?” he asked.

  “Be yourself.” Then she spoke to Maria. “Could we have a celebration here tonight?”

  “It could be arranged. Someone will have to go to town for what I will need.”

  “One of the men can get what you need. Just make a list.”

  Maria nodded and drew a paper and pencil from her apron pocket.

  “Good. Where can I change?” the young widow asked, looking around, and then spoke to him. “You would show me the river and this country on horseback?”

  “I’m willing.”

  “Bring your things to my casa. I can help you change,” Maria said.

  “That is so nice of you. But you have to get ready.”

  Maria dismissed that, then took her and a valise to the house.

  “Tell my men they can split cooking wood,” she called back over her shoulder.

  Jesus went to saddle both of them a horse. Cole tossed down his wine. “That is some lady.”

  Chet’s stare followed her until Maria’s casa swallowed her. “I have to say she is different.”

  The two of them rode over the countryside for a while in quiet companionship. The ruffled blouse she wore, with a divided riding skirt and handmade boots, showed off her figure. She was a handsome woman. When her head turned, silver hoop earrings danced, and the sunlight coming in spears through the tall cottonwoods glinted off them. Nearby, the Santa Cruz River ran over round rocks worn smooth by centuries of passing current. When she spotted the water, she asked him to stop.

  They dismounted and she sat on a large flat rock. “Would you pull off my boots so I can wade in the water?”

  “Sure, we all need to be free once in a while and do something like that.” He gently removed them and her socks. When he pulled her to her feet, she kissed him softly on the cheek with a “gracias.”

  That spot her lips touched burned through the week’s beard stubble. She splashed about in the shallow water, holding her skirt up and looking pleased. Her laughter carried over the rustle of a million rattling cottonwood leaves in the warm wind. Free and clear, with the expensive brown cowboy hat cocked back on her head, he saw a very beautiful, proud, young woman. Everything else faded away and there was only the two of them in this world of streaming shafts of golden light.

  “Where are you going?” she called out when he stood up.

  “To get a towel to dry your feet.”

  “Ah—fine. I thought you were through with me acting like a schoolgirl.”

  He shook his head and smiled at her words. Actually, he could have watched her all day. Towel in hand, he returned to where she sat on a large flat rock. He carefully dried her small feet, replaced the socks, then the boots. She sat with her hands behind her, bracing for each boot to go back on.

  “You are so good. Most men would have said, ‘Come on, foolish girl, I have things to do.’”

  He shook his head. “I think you’re like a butterfly, flitting from one flower to the next one.”

  “Really?” They walked toward the horses, loosely holding hands. She stopped him. “That was very romantic to say to me. Thank you.”

  They set out again to walk to their grazing mounts, and when they reached the rise, she removed her hat, pulled him to her with her back to the rough bark of the giant tree. His guts roiled. If she stood there one more moment longer, whiskers or not, he was going to kiss her.

  His arms gathered her up, and then she put her finger on her lips. “I will kiss you and make love to you, for you are such a real hombre, but never just for a horse. Do you savvy me?”

  “Yes, I do.” Then he kissed her,
and all the grief and pain of the previous months faded away, leaving only pleasant memories.

  CHAPTER 2

  When the two rode back, Cole took their horses.

  “Ma’am, that sidewall tent is yours to dress and sleep in,” he said. “Your people put your things in there this afternoon, and one of the boys’ wives, Consuela, said if you need help, she’d sure help you change.”

  She laughed. “My, your service is so good here, Señor Byrnes.”

  Amused by her words, he shook his head and spoke to his man. “Thanks, Cole. You all did lots of work for tonight.” He indicated all the fandango preparation.

  “That Maria can whip up a party in no time.”

  Cole left them to put up the horses.

  “May I have some water and a bath?”

  “I’m sure we can do that.”

  “That can be a lot of trouble in a camp like this.”

  He dismissed the idea with a wave of his hand and told her to wait. He soon found Jesus who agreed to attend to it. Then he led her over to his bench. Soon, a good-sized washtub arrived and disappeared into her tent. Jesus gave Chet a sign the water was heating. He waved his thanks.

  “Would it be too much to ask you to help me undress?”

  Startled, he hesitated before finding his voice. “No, but you might get ravished.”

  “I don’t think so. If you think I am too bold, let me say that I have never been with but one man in my life. That was my husband. You are not him, nothing like him. But today, I kept saying to myself that you will think I am too bold. But I know our time together here is short, and I have measured it carefully. I want you to see who I am. I know it is too soon since you lost your wife, but I want to be a candidate for her place.”

  “We only met this morning.”

  “Has it not really been hours and days longer than that?”

  Chet looked down at her. “We have crammed a lot in during that time.”

  “Crammed?”

  “It means overloaded the suitcase and sat on it to close it.”

  She broke out laughing and bent over. “Ah, yes. We have done that.”

  “They’re taking the hot water to your tent.”

  “Will you come with me?”

  “Yes. I need to get my razor and shaving cup. I’ll join you.”

  He pulled her to her feet, wanting to kiss her, but didn’t. “I won’t be long.”

  Cole met him halfway there with his shaving gear. “You looking for this?”

  “Thanks.”

  “Looks like your day, boss. She damn sure is a great Spanish treasure.”

  “I think so, too.”

  He ducked under the tent flap, set his things down, and tied it shut. Then he removed his hat and set it on a case. The smell of heated water drifted to his nose. She stood before him, dressed.

  Hell’s bells. She expected him to undress her. He began with shaky hands, and the entire time it was like unwrapping a surprise package. Damn, she said she wanted to be a candidate to be his wife. What would they do? Her ranch was in Mexico, and his own places sat miles away in Arizona. But this was too good to pass up. At last, he had his gift unwrapped. Oh, my God. She looked like an angel. He dropped his butt onto the cot, hypnotized by her beauty in the translucent light coming through the tent’s skin.

  She stepped into the tub. “And you didn’t even kiss me.”

  “Hell, girl, I have all my life to do that.”

  Busy soaping a cloth, she never answered.

  He went on, “Hell, I came down here to straighten out things, not fall in love.”

  “I stopped here to buy a stallion this morning. I had no notion who you were. Even what you looked like. I’d met your wife. But that was years ago in Mexico, before you married her. Do you think God brought me here?”

  He stood up, then knelt down beside the tub. With his hands on both sides of the tub, not daring to touch her skin, he kissed her. “I don’t know if God helps fornicators, but he surely sent you to me.”

  “You are not disappointed?” She stood up and he grabbed a bucket of warm water to rinse her off. With the water pouring over her, she looked like a drowning urchin.

  She reached for a towel to dry herself off. “Your turn.”

  He was soon in the tub, and she used a washcloth on his back. “Now that I can see you, you are a very big man.”

  “Does my size scare you?”

  “No.”

  He shook his head. “Tell me why I’m not embarrassed to death with you here, and me naked, taking a bath?”

  “The Mexican people have a saying, ‘What is to be, is to be.’”

  When he finished, she wore a robe and sat on the cot.

  “Our day is fading fast. Maybe I am a silly girl you have found. Would you find a blanket after the dance is over tonight and take me to a haystack?”

  “Nothing is ever silly in a serious relationship.”

  “I don’t want you to remember taking me on a fainting couch. You are such an outdoors man, I want you to remember me when you are feeding your horses, being under the stars, going to bed on the ground.”

  “Tell me how bad you were offended when you asked me about the horse offer?”

  “If I thought for an instant that you wanted me only for my body, I would never do this. It would have broken my heart. But you didn’t know me then. I didn’t know you. I also know now what your wife knew. You are a helluva bighearted man who, if you choose me, I will have to share with the world, but in the pages between, our lives will be rich. I must tell you in the four years of my married life I never bore him a son or daughter—”

  “I entered my last marriage like that. Yet we were blessed with Adam.”

  “His name is Adam, you said?”

  He nodded, then adjusted the small mirror on the tent pole and went to shaving. “You have your address on the card? I wrote my wife tons of letters.”

  “Yes, mail will find me. I will feel very important, getting letters from you.”

  “Don’t expect poetry.”

  She laughed. ”I am still thinking about the butterfly comment you said to me.”

  He squinted in the mirror and shaved his upper lip. “Just suited the occasion.”

  “What will you do tomorrow?”

  “Ride over to Rancho Diablo and see my nephew, JD, and his wife, Bonnie.”

  “How long will you be gone?”

  “A day to go, a couple days to look everything over, and a day to come back. You’re welcome to come along.”

  She shook her head. “If I spent another day with you, you would never be able to get rid of me. I need to go home and be sure everything is working. It does well, but I am still the one who must run it. You understand? You have all those ranches.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “I am wearing a simple blue dress tonight—for you to unwrap later.”

  “Fine, I am highly honored.”

  “No. If you find a better woman I can always say, I had him one wonderful, sunny, warm day, down on the Santa Cruz River.” She drew a deep breath. “I feel like a dust devil who has been swept across the desert floor all day, whirling and dancing in a mad trip. May I burn candles in the chapel for your safety?”

  “Sure, keep me in your prayers. You’ll be in mine.”

  After they finished dressing, she stood beside him, ready to go out to the festivities, and she patted his shoulder. “This has been one of the greatest days in my life, hombre.”

  “Mine, too. I’m going to call you Liz.”

  “Fine. I will know who is calling me. No one ever called me that in my life.” He kissed her. Strange, how wonderful things in life simply happened when least expected.

  CHAPTER 3

  When he and Cole and Jesus arrived at the Diablo Ranch the next evening, he was still looking back once in a while and thinking hard about her. When they dismounted at the corrals, the smell of hay brought the memory of her back to him.

  That evening at supper, Bonnie sat at h
is side. She gently elbowed him. “Tell me about the Mexican widow you entertained yesterday?”

  “Cole has been talking to you.” He laughed at her curiosity.

  “Since you all got me out of down there in Mexico, he and I are old friends. So, how about her?”

  “She’s a widow, and has a big hacienda down there. She’s been a widow for a few years. And she and I just hit it off.”

  “Why did she stop there?”

  “She wanted a Barbarossa stallion. She said she’d heard that I sold them to a friend of hers in Mexico. I told her I never sold any, except the ones I sold in Texas for the train ride. That, instead, I had swapped them for a person’s life.”

  “Yes, and, thank God, you did that for me.”

  “I’m still not sure she’s not a bruja. No, she is not. She’s very real. The two of us went off on a lark yesterday, and she waded in the river. We had a nice afternoon, and please keep this part to yourself, I started to kiss her. She stopped me and told me she would not kiss me for a horse, but she would kiss me for her love.”

  Bonnie stopped eating and put down her fork. “She told you that?”

  Chet nodded his head. “Powerful, huh?”

  “You’d only just met her, and all that happened yesterday?”

  “Yesterday was over a month long.”

  “What will you do now?”

  “Do my job here and up there. And think about her.”

  “Is she as beautiful as Cole said?”

  “Maybe more than that.”

  “No one in our family will care. It’s time you had a life. Marge would want that for you. Why don’t you ride down there and grab her?”

  “I better let it mellow. She has things to attend to down there. And I have things to do up here.”

  “Oh, Chet, it sounds like a romance made in heaven.”

  “Time will tell. But I had no intention of even looking for someone.”

  She rose and whispered in his ear. “Marge would never complain, knowing you were happy again.”

  “I hear you. Thanks.”

  The rest went easy. They had drilled two artesian wells on the ranch. The plan was to float some land cleared of greasewood and cactus, then plant alfalfa. Lemon and orange trees came next, then vineyards. Bonnie’s house was well designed for the hot desert, an airy structure that caught the prevailing winds. Maria’s house would soon be roofed and she’d move over there while her husband was on the south end, catching mustangs and shipping them to Mexico. JD promised him that the operation broke even, and it would eventually increase the range for cattle.