The Brothers O'Brien

by J. A. Johnstone

  “I will, later. First I wish to speak with Jacob.” She turned her head. “Ah, he and his brothers are talking with my father.” Aracela directed her attention back to Ironside. “Please, when he is free, ask him to visit me at the hacienda.”

  Ironside nodded. “I sure will, ma’am. Now get yourself inside.”

  He watched the woman walk away, tall, stately, with the kind of body that keeps a thinking man awake of nights. Ironside nodded. She was a fine lady, no doubt about that.

  “You avenged the deaths of my villagers,” Don Manuel said, “and for that I am grateful. But, like the devil Whitney and his mercenaries, I want you off the Estancia.” Flanked by vaqueros, the Mexican stood bareheaded in the snow, a woolen military cloak slung over his shoulders. “You have Dromore, Mr. O’Brien, and now you must go back to it.”

  “I will,” Shawn said, “if the sheep stay well away from our range.”

  Don Manuel looked around him, saw the man he wanted, and called him over. The peon was nervous, his gaze constantly shifting from his patron to the hard-eyed vaqueros. The don said something to the man in quick Spanish and Shawn caught only a few words of it.

  Finally Don Manuel looked at Shawn again. “This man says the sheepherders are scared, and, indeed, there is much talk of moving north onto your grazing lands.”

  “Have any sheep passed Lobo Hill?” Shawn said.

  Don Manuel spoke to the peon again, then again to Shawn. “He says not yet, but if another herder is killed that will change very quickly.”

  Shawn was about to make war talk to the peon, but realized it was useless. It would be like threatening the north wind not to bring the winter snows.

  Don Manuel saw his confusion and said, “I will rid the Estancia of the Whitney infestation very quickly. Once the land is free of him, the herders will stay, and those that have already crossed into Dromore will return.”

  “I can’t let that happen, Don Manuel,” Shawn said. “I won’t allow a single sheep to set foot on our range.”

  The Mexican let out a theatrical sigh. “Then I can do no more for you. I’m sorry, Mr. O’Brien, but you will be gone from the Estancia by this time tomorrow. If you still remain, my men will consider you an enemy.” He waved hand toward a group of weeping women. “Now go, and let us bury our dead.”

  Shawn knew he was being pushed, but let it go. To put Don Manuel on guard could ruin his plans. He swallowed his pride and said only, “I’ll leave your people to their grief.”

  But Don Manuel had already walked away, as though he hadn’t the slightest interest in what Shawn O’Brien had to say.

  “Luther told me you wanted to see me, Donna Aracela,” Jacob said.

  The woman smiled. Her hair was piled on top of her head, held in place by a tortoiseshell comb. Jacob figured if she was not the prettiest gal in the West, she came almighty close.

  “I’m afraid you visit the Hacienda Ortero at a sad time,” Aracela said. “There is much to be mourned.”

  “Well, it wasn’t a hug-the-kinfolk kind of visit,” Jacob said. “We brought back the three men who were killed by Whitney’s riders.”

  “You haven’t told me when I can hear you play.”

  “I don’t know. Soon, maybe.”

  “How very vague, Jacob.”

  “Maybe it’s because I’m living in parlous times.”

  “But there is nothing parlous between us, is there?”

  “No. Unless we end up on opposite sides.”

  “Look out there, Jacob. My father is talking with your brother. Perhaps they can work things out.”

  “I sure hope so.”

  Aracela waved to a silver jug and goblets on the parlor table. “Wine?”

  “Too early in the morning for me,” Jacob said.

  “Do you mind if I do?”

  “No, please go ahead.”

  The wine poured bloodred into Aracela’s goblet. She drank, and then said, “Have you thought more about our wedding day?”

  Jacob smiled. “I’ve already told you, I’m not the marrying kind.”

  She laid her glass on the table and stepped close to him. As she pressed her body against his, her arms encircled his neck. Her searching lips hungrily found his.

  He surrendered to the pleasure the woman brought him, the feel of her body so close, her grinding hips, and the firmness of her breasts. His manhood swelling, he pushed hard against her, but Aracela smiled against his mouth and stepped back.

  “What’s wrong?” Jacob said, his voice husky with desire.

  “Not like this,” she said. “After we marry, you’ll bed me and I’ll make you bless the day you were born. I want a son from you, Jacob, a son.”

  “Hell, I can give you a son without us getting hitched.”

  “No!” Aracela’s eyes blazed. “I don’t want a bastard. A bastard cannot become master of the Hacienda Ortero.”

  “Hell, then why me?” Jacob said.

  “Because you are a man. Mucho hombre!”

  She stepped toward him, her eyes aglow, but Jacob held up a hand. “No, not again. I’m still recovering from the last time.” He managed a weak smile. “I was told men died after kissing you. Now I know what that means, because I’m dying a hundred different kinds of death right now.”

  Aracela drank again. A thin trickle of wine ran from the corner of her bruised mouth like blood. “You will come to me again, Jacob. I will send for you and we will talk of our wedding day.”

  She laid the goblet down, turned, and swept from the room.

  Jacob’s head was reeling, as though he’d drained Aracela’s silver wine jug to the last, scarlet drop.

  Outside, his brothers and Ironside waited for him at the far end of the village. Shawn’s face was tight, the weather lines showing deep. Ironside was solemn, but Patrick grinned from ear to ear when Jacob rode up to him.

  “Ah, brother, and how is La Belle Dame Sans Merci ?”

  “Huh?” Jacob said, his eyes unfocussed.

  “Then you haven’t read the poem by John Keats, about the knight who falls in love with a fairy princess who loves him and leaves him.”

  “Hell, are you taking about Donna Aracela?”

  “No brother, I’m talking about you.” Patrick’s grin grew. “‘O what can ail thee knight at arms, alone and palely loitering? The sedge has wither’d from the lake, and no birds sing.’”

  “I’d say he’s pale because Donna Aracela is still determined to marry him,” Shawn said.

  Jacob nodded. “Yeah, something like that.” He shook his head, trying to clear his brain. “I swear, it’s like the woman cast a spell on me.”

  “I’ve got a pretty good idea what she cast a spell on,” Shawn said. “Get your mind above your belt buckle and back on the job, Jacob. Unless I’m very much mistaken, we’ll soon have troubles coming at us from every direction.”

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Shawn O’Brien stared across the snow and wind-swept plain east of Lobo Hill. “Not a wooly in sight. They aren’t moving north, at least not yet.”

  “I reckon that’ll change when Joel Whitney gets here,” Ironside brushed snow from his mustache with the back of his gloved hand. “He’ll scare them herders into a run.”

  The land around the Dromore riders lay white under a black sky, but it was more frost than snow, and the ground underneath was iron hard. Above them a red-tailed hawk quartered the sky, its wings motionless as it sailed the air currents.

  Andre Perez, a far-sighted man, stood in his stirrups, his eyes searching into the distance.

  “What do you see, Andre?” Patrick looked where Perez looked, but saw nothing, only the blustering snow.

  “I thought I saw something move in the draw,” Perez said.

  “An antelope, maybe?” Patrick said.

  The vaquero shook his head. “A rider, I think.”

  Jacob slid the Winchester from the boot under his left knee. He said to Ironside, “Apache?”

  “I doubt it.” Ironside said. “
Only white men are crazy enough to ride out in this kind of weather. It’s more likely Clay Stanley decided to break his truce.”

  “I’ll go take a look-see,” Jacob said.

  Shawn kneed his mount forward. “I’ll come with you.” He turned to the others. “If you see us split-ass away from there, come a-shooting.”

  Jacob and Shawn rode toward the draw at a walk, snow stinging into their faces. “Hell,” Shawn said, “I can’t see a damn thing.”

  “Well, it isn’t a bushwhacker,” Jacob said.

  “How come?”

  “Because he’d be shooting by now.”

  Jacob reined to his left and rode up on the draw at its widest point. Piñon, juniper, and a few cottonwoods grew on the sand and shingle slope. Ice puddles were scattered along the bottom. He swung out of the saddle and stepped to the top of the slope, his rifle up and ready.

  “See anything?” Shawn called out above the howl of the wind. He sat his horse about twenty yards away near a mesquite thicket, a Colt in his hand.

  “Nothing,” Jacob yelled back.

  Snow flurried through the draw and the wind bit savagely. Jacob’s face was raw from cold and the fingers in his gloves were stiff. He made his way down the slope, digging in his heels to avoid sliding, doubt accompanying each tentative step.

  After what seemed like an eternity, Jacob reached the bottom of the draw. Despite the snow, hoofprints were still visible in the sand, heading east. He followed the tracks for fifty yards, but then lost them. The rider had left the draw at that point and disappeared into the darkness of the day.

  Shawn stood on the top of the slope. “What do you reckon?”

  “I reckon we’re being watched,” Jacob said.

  “Stanley?”

  “Could be.”

  Shawn holstered his gun. “Let’s go ask him.”

  “Suits me,” Jacob said. “I’ve had enough of snow and ice for one day.”

  None of the horses in the hotel barn had been ridden recently. Jacob acknowledged that fact, then said, “Well, we know it wasn’t one of Stanley’s men.”

  “Then it could only be Don Manuel,” Shawn said.

  “Why? He’d just spoken with us. And he knew where we were headed. He didn’t need to spy on us.”

  Shawn shook his head. “Then it’s a mystery.”

  “Yeah,” Jacob said, “but one we could do without.”

  The O’Briens walked into the hotel parlor, bringing cold air with them. Fat flakes of snow fell from their coats and boots.

  Clay Stanley was taking his ease by the fire, a book in his hands. He looked up, smiled, and laid the book on the side table beside his chair. “You boys delivered the dead Mexicans, huh?”

  “Your men did the killing, Clay,” Jacob said. “It should’ve been your job.”

  The Texan shrugged. “It was none of my doing.”

  “Your boss arrived yet, Stanley?” Shawn said.

  “No. Not yet.”

  “Then why are you wearing your guns?”

  “Because I feel undressed without them.” He looked pointedly at Shawn’s open coat. “You’re wearing yours.”

  “Yeah, for killing varmints,” Shawn said, the challenge in his voice easy to hear.

  But Stanley, unruffled, took it in stride. “Plenty of those around the Estancia.” Patrick picked up the Texan’s book from the table and glanced at the spine. “Jane Eyre. Are you keen on Charlotte Brontë?”

  “Hell, I don’t know. Somebody left the book in my room. It’s about this little gal who—”

  “I know what it’s about,” Patrick said.

  “Them English gals are mighty strange,” Stanley said.

  “Seems like all the gals we’ve met recently are that way,” Shawn said, his eyes angling to Jacob.

  His brother smiled and said nothing.

  Just before midnight, Joel Whitney led a column of twenty riders and six mule wagons into Estancia.

  After he palmed a clear circle in the frosted pane, Jacob watched from his bedroom window. Men, horses, and wagons were covered in snow and moved through the darkness like gray ghosts. A small man wearing an ankle-length fur coat dismounted and shouted orders, his breath steaming in the crystalline air.

  His men dismounted, then four of them gathered up the horses and headed for the barn. The rest, led by the small man—who could only be Joel Whitney—crowded into the hotel, and Jacob heard the clump of booted feet in the lobby below.

  He dressed quickly, strapped on his gun, and stepped to Shawn’s room.

  His brother was already awake and armed. “Get the others up, We’ll go down to the parlor and see what’s shaking.”

  A few minutes later, the O’Briens, Ironside, and Perez stepped into the parlor where Whitney was arguing with the owner, a handsome, portly woman who called herself Mrs. Hazel. Behind her, the desk clerk wrung his hands and looked scared.

  “But there’s a saloon just across the way, Mr. Whitney,” the woman said. “I’m sure you can wake the owner, Mr. Simpson. He’s such a nice man.”

  “You serve booze here, am I right?” Whitney said.

  “Yes, but—”

  “Then bring all the bottles you have in here. My men need a drink and they need it now.”

  He turned away from Mrs. Hazel, but swung back on her. “And rooms. I need rooms for myself and twenty-six men.”

  “But this is a small hotel.” The woman’s face was frantic. “I have only twelve rooms, and all but one is occupied.”

  “How many rooms do my men already have?” Whitney had the eyes of a carrion-eater.

  “Three. But—”

  “Then throw the others out, and you’ll have nine rooms available.”

  “But I can’t throw my guests out in the snow,” Mrs. Hazel said.

  “Oh dear me, no,” the clerk said, wringing his hands some more. “That just isn’t done.”

  “All right, if you don’t want to do it, I will,” Whitney said.

  “Then I guess you’d better start with me,” Jacob stood easy, his right thumb hooked into his gun belt near his holstered Colt. His eyes were colder than the night outside.

  Sudden anger flared in Whitney’s face. “Who the hell are you?”

  “I’m one of the guests you plan to throw out in the snow. I’d take being rousted from my room real hard.”

  It was a measure of Whitney’s arrogance that he didn’t recognize the warning signs that the tall, hatchet-faced man was ready and had no backup in him.

  But Clay Stanley knew better.

  He watched the Dromore men spread out on either side of Jacob and noted the whispering uncertainty of the hired guns. The parlor was small and crowded with furniture. In a close-range drawfight with tough men who knew how to shoot, the concussion of the revolvers would extinguish the oil lamps and fill the room with smoke. Men would drop in the darkness, and it didn’t take a mastermind to figure out that far too many of them would be Texans.

  Stanley’s words dropped like rocks into the tense silence and ended it. “Mr. Whitney, these men are my friends.”

  Every man present knew the next move was Whitney’s. Despite his growing irritation, the little man realized he’d run out of room on the dance floor. It was not the place or the time to push a gunfight.

  “All right,” he said to Mrs. Hazel, “since these men are friends of Mr. Stanley, leave them be, but clear out the rest of the rooms. My boys will double up. They won’t be here long.”

  Mrs. Hazel was horrified. “But there’s old Widow Allison, who can barely walk, and old Mr. Robson who has the rheumatisms, and—”

  “I don’t give a damn. Get them out of here.” Whitney glared at the woman. “If you’re so all-fired worried about the old people, take them into your room.” He pointed at a couple of his men. “You two, see that the rooms are cleared.”

  The grinning gunmen walked to the door, Mrs. Hazel following after them, clucking like a distressed hen.

  “And don’t forget the whiskey,” W
hitney called out to her retreating back.

  The desk clerk continued wringing his hands and said, “I’ll bring the refreshments right away, gentlemen.”

  “Good,” Whitney said. “Now get the hell out of here.” He waved a dismissive hand at Jacob. “And that goes for you, too.”

  Outside the snow lay thick on the canvas covers of Joel Whitney’s wagons and a rambunctious wind tossed icy flakes at the mules and howled its delight.

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Shadows flickered in the chapel of the Hacienda Ortero as Donna Aracela lit a second candle and placed it on the altar, to the right of the tabernacle where the village priest kept the consecrated hosts. The candle flame cast light on the nearby image of Our Lady of Montserrat. The Black Madonna’s statue was an exact copy of the one that stood in the Santa Maria monastery in Catalonia, and Don Manuel had brought an artist all the way from Spain to carve it.

  Donna Aracela, her hair covered by a mantilla of fine black lace, left the altar and kneeled in a pew. She let her rosary beads count through her fingers, her scarlet lips moving in prayer.

  A sleek wind rapped the chapel’s arched wooden doors, demanding entry. Intrusive gusts made the flames of the altar candles dance and stirred the tapestries on the walls. The air smelled of incense and smoke, and of Donna Aracela’s perfume.

  Midnight came and went, then the chapel doors opened, letting in a blast of icy air and snow. The man who stepped inside had trouble pushing the doors shut against the wind, but he finally slammed them home and shoved a wooden bolt into place. His spurs ringing on the flagstone floor, he walked toward the altar, then kneeled beside the woman.

  She turned her head and looked at the vaquero. “Well?”

  “I have bad news.”

  “Then you killed no one.”

  “I watched them for a while, but the weather was so bad I could not risk a shot.”

  “I want the man with the handsome face dead first, Otilio. He does not like me and could be a problem.”

  “I won’t fail you next time, Donna Aracela.”

  “See that you don’t. I expect much of you, Otilio, now and in the future.”