A Stone Creek Collection Volume 1

by Linda Lael Miller

  * * *

  MADDIE CHANCELOR was measuring flour into a tin canister to fill Mrs. Ezra T. Burke’s weekly grocery order, when Terran burst into the store, shirttail out, hair rumpled, face aflame.

  “The new teacher’s here,” he blurted before she could ask if he’d been fighting again, “and he just tried his best to kill me!”

  Instant alarm swelled within Maddie’s breast, fair cutting off her wind, and her hands trembled as she set the scoop aside on the counter. “Kill you? What on earth…?”

  “He would have drowned me in the well if I hadn’t got the best of him,” Terran insisted.

  “Drowned you in the—”

  “Well,” Terran finished in furious triumph.

  Maddie untied her apron laces as she rounded the counter to examine her younger brother for injuries. He looked sound, and for someone who had nearly been murdered by drowning, he was remarkably dry, too.

  “Tell me what happened,” she said, grateful, for once, that the mercantile was empty.

  Terran gulped visibly. “He got me by the feet and tried to drop me down the schoolyard well,” he burst out. “I hid out in the brush, after I got away, or he’d have finished me for sure!”

  Maddie’s heart seized at the image of her brother, her only living relation, suspended from such a height. Haven was a wild town, a crossroads for rogues, scalawags and scoundrels from both sides of the border, but she hadn’t expected the new schoolmaster to number among them. Anxiously she looked Terran over again. “You’re certain you haven’t been hurt?”

  Terran nodded. “He said he’d be by here, real soon, to talk to you. He’s going to tell you a whole passel of lies, Maddie. He’ll say—”

  Just then, the little brass bell over the door jingled and a man entered, removing his hat as he traversed the threshold.

  Terran took one look at him and bolted for the stairs at the back of the store to take refuge in their rooms.

  Maddie’s face flamed. “You must be the new schoolmaster,” she said.

  He smiled, nodded. “Sam O’Ballivan,” he replied. “And you must be Miss Chancelor.”

  Maddie gave a curt nod. Sam O’Ballivan was clean-shaven and muscular, probably six feet in height, with brown hair and shrewd blue eyes. He looked more like an outlaw than a schoolmaster, and she was sure the distinctive bulge under his long suit coat was the butt of a pistol. What had Mr. Callaway and the other members of the school board been thinking, to hire such a man?

  “How dare you assault my brother?” she asked evenly, when she could trust herself to speak at all.

  Mr. O’Ballivan’s mouth tilted upward at one corner. He kept his distance, though, which meant Maddie didn’t have to go for the shotgun she kept under the counter in case of trouble. “Is that what he told you? Guess he’s got a devious side, to go along with that mean streak of his.”

  Maddie felt like a kettle coming to a boil. “Terran is not a liar, nor does he have a ‘mean streak,’” she managed to say. “And it’s a fine how-do-you-do, your saying that, when you tried to drown him!”

  O’Ballivan chuckled, and what looked like mischievous derision glinted briefly in his eyes. His blatant masculinity seemed to take over the whole store, like some ominous, unseen force. Maddie would have described him as rugged, rather than handsome, if she’d been thinking along such lines.

  Which she most definitely wasn’t.

  “The truth, Miss Chancelor, is somewhat at variance with your brother’s account of the incident in question,” O’Ballivan said. “When I rode up, he and the rest of that pack of rascals had Tom Singleton hog-tied and hanging headfirst down the well. God knows how long he’d have dangled if I hadn’t come along when I did.”

  Maddie blinked. It wasn’t true, she told herself firmly. Terran would never be involved in anything like that.

  “I don’t believe you,” she said.

  “You don’t choose to believe me,” he remarked idly, examining a display of dime novels Maddie had spent much of the morning arranging. She disapproved heartily of yellow journalism, but the plain fact was, folks were willing to spend money on those little books, and she couldn’t afford not to carry the merchandise.

  At long last O’Ballivan’s gaze swung back, colliding with hers. Maddie felt a peculiar niggling in the pit of her stomach.

  “You’re not doing your brother any favors, you know, by taking his part when you know he’s in the wrong,” he said.

  “Did you or did you not try to drown him?”

  “If I’d tried to drown him,” O’Ballivan said reasonably, “I would have succeeded. All I did was demonstrate that hanging headfirst down a well, while memorable, is not a desirable experience.”

  Maddie swallowed so hard it hurt. “What if you’d dropped him?”

  “I wouldn’t have,” he responded, damnably self-assured.

  She slipped behind the counter again, in case she needed the shotgun. “I will not tolerate that kind of rough treatment,” she insisted, making an effort to keep her voice from rising. “Terran is a child, Mr. O’Ballivan.”

  He drew near enough to rest his hands between the pickle crock and a pyramid of bright red tobacco cans. “Terran,” he said, “is a spoiled, bullying brat. And I, Miss Chancelor, will not tolerate the sort of behavior I witnessed today. I was hired to restore order in that school, and I will do it—however many times I have to hold your brother over a well by his feet. Do we understand each other?”

  Maddie felt heat surge up her neck to pulse along her cheekbones, and her ears burned. “If you lay a hand on him again,” she said, “I will have you dismissed.”

  He smiled slightly. “Then I guess we do understand each other. You’re welcome to try to get rid of me, Miss Chancelor, but if what I saw in that schoolyard a little while ago is typical, I’d say I’m just the kind of teacher this town needs.”

  “You don’t look like a schoolmaster,” Maddie said.

  “And you don’t look like a storekeeper,” Mr. O’Ballivan retorted. “I guess appearances can be deceiving.”

  Maddie resisted an impulse to pat her hair, which tended to be unruly and was forever coming down from its pins. “What does a storekeeper look like?” she retorted.

  “What does a schoolmaster look like?” he countered.

  Maddie sighed and glanced hopefully toward the door, wishing the man would leave and stop taking up all the room in her store. “If you have no further business here, Mr. O’Ballivan—”

  “It happens that I do,” he said, and she knew by the light in his eyes that he enjoyed baiting her. “I’d like to collect my mail. You are the postmistress, aren’t you?”

  Letters and packages came into Haven once a week, on the stagecoach, which had been and gone by four o’clock that afternoon. Busy with Mrs. Burke’s order, which she had promised to deliver personally after closing, she’d told the driver to put the mail in the back room and promptly forgotten all about it.

  “Yes,” Maddie said. “I am the postmistress. But I haven’t had a chance to do any sorting.”

  “There should be a parcel addressed to me,” O’Ballivan told her, and showed no sign of moving away from the counter, let alone leaving the premises.

  Maddie glanced at the large, loud-ticking clock on the far wall, above the display window. “I’m about to close for the day.”

  Again, that slow, thoughtful smile. “Well, then,” Sam O’Ballivan said, “if you’ll just point me to that parcel, I’ll be on my way.”

  Maddie sighed. “I’ll get it for you,” she conceded, and turned away.

  “It’s bound to be too heavy,” he argued, and came right around the end of the counter without so much as a by-your-leave. “Just show me where it is.”

  Impatient, Maddie tossed aside the curtain covering the entrance to the back of the store and gestured toward the corner where the mail had been stowed. Sure enough, there was a very large box wrapped in brown paper and tied with heavy string.

  Mr. O’Ballivan
lifted it with one hand, tilted it slightly so she could see the large, slanted letters on the face of the package: S. O’Ballivan, c/o General Delivery, Haven, Arizona Territory.

  He’d saved her the awkwardness of asking for proof that the parcel belonged to him before releasing it, but Maddie wasn’t grateful. She just wanted him gone, so she could close the store, tally the books and deliver Mrs. Burke’s groceries. She wanted the place to expand to its normal size, so she could breathe.

  “Obliged,” he said, pausing in the front doorway to don his hat again. He tugged lightly at the brim.

  “Goodbye, Mr. O’Ballivan,” Maddie said pointedly, right on his heels. She put one hand on the door lock, eager to latch it behind him.

  He shifted the parcel from one hand to the other, as easily as if it were a basket of eggs. “Until next time,” he said, and touched his hat brim again.

  Maddie, already moving to shut the door, frowned. “Do you receive a lot of mail?”

  “No,” Mr. O’Ballivan replied, “but I expect we’ll have a few more rounds over your brother.”

  Maddie gave the door a shove and latched it.

  Mr. O’Ballivan smiled at her through the glass.

  She wrenched down the shade.

  As she turned away, she was certain she heard him laugh.

  * * *

  BACK IN HIS ROOM behind the schoolhouse, Sam built a fire in the stove, ladled water into the coffeepot that came with the place, along with the last of Tom Singleton’s stash of ground beans, and set the concoction on to boil.

  If Miss Maddie Chancelor hadn’t run him off so quickly, he’d have had time to lay in a few staples. As things stood, he’d need to take his supper at the saloon and bring the leftovers home for breakfast.

  After school let out tomorrow, he’d go back to the mercantile.

  Like as not, Miss Maddie wouldn’t be all that glad to see him.

  Sam smiled at the thought and turned his attention to the parcel. He’d packed the books himself, before starting the trip down from Stone Creek, and taken them to the stagecoach office for shipping. Now, he looked forward to putting up his feet when he got back from taking his meal, and reading until the lamp ran low on kerosene.

  Of course, he’d have to shake Maddie’s image loose from his mind before he’d be able to concentrate worth a damn.

  After what the boy and Singleton had said, he’d expected someone entirely different. An aging, mean-eyed spinster with warts, maybe. Or a rough-edged Calamity Jane sort of woman, brawny enough to do a man’s work.

  The real Maddie had come as quite a surprise, with her slender figure and thick, reddish-brown hair, ready to tumble down over her back and shoulders at the slightest provocation. She couldn’t have been much past twenty-five, and while that probably qualified her as an old maid, it was a pure wonder to him that some lonely bachelor hadn’t tumbled right into those rum-colored eyes and snatched her up a long time ago. Women such as her were few and far between, this far west of the Mississippi, and generally had their choice of men.

  Her temperament was on the cussed side, it was true, but there was fire in her; he’d felt the heat the moment he’d stepped into the mercantile and locked eyes with her.

  He smiled again as he opened the stove door and stuck in another chunk of wood, hoping to get the coffee perking sooner and wondering how long it would be before the lady organized a campaign to send the new schoolmaster down the road.

  Satisfied that the stove was doing the best it could, Sam opened the box to unpack his books. Except for his horse, Dionysus, grazing on sweet hay up in the high country while a lame leg mended, he treasured these worn and oft-read volumes more than anything else he owned. Some were warped by damp weather and creek water, having traveled miles in his saddlebags, while others had been scarred by sparks from forgotten campfires.

  All of them were old friends, and Sam handled them tenderly as he silently welcomed each one to a new home. When he got time, he’d find a plank of wood somewhere and put up a shelf they could stand on. In the meantime, they made good company, sitting right there on the table.

  He’d attended to the gelding earlier, staking it on a long line in the tall grass behind the schoolhouse, where a little stream made its crooked way from hither to yon, and stowed his tack in the woodshed. Now, as twilight thickened around the walls and purpled the windowpanes, he lit a lamp and used his shirttail to wipe out the blue metal mug he carried with him whenever he left the ranch.

  He’d just poured coffee when a light knock sounded at the back door.

  Sam arched an eyebrow and checked to make sure his .45 was within easy reach, there on the rickety table next to the bed. He wasn’t expecting anybody.

  “Mr. O’Ballivan?” a female voice called, thin as a shred of frayed ribbon. “Are you to home?”

  Curious, Sam opened the door.

  The woman stood in a dim wash of moonlight, holding a basket and smiling up at him. Since no proper lady would have come calling on an unmarried man, especially after dark, he wasn’t surprised by her skimpy attire. She was a dance hall girl.

  She laughed at his expression. “I brung you some vittles,” she said, and shoved the basket at him. “Compliments of Miss Oralee Pringle, over to the Rattlesnake Saloon. She said to tell you welcome to Haven, and be sure to pay us a visit first chance you get. I don’t reckon I ought to come in?”

  Sam cleared his throat, accepted the basket. It felt warm in his hands and smelled deliciously of fresh-baked bread and fried chicken. His stomach growled. “I don’t suppose you ought to,” he agreed, at a loss. “But thank you, Miss—?”

  The response was a coy smile. “My name is Bird of Paradise,” she said, “but you can call me Bird.”

  Sam frowned. Behind that mask of powder and kohl was the face of a schoolgirl. “How old are you?”

  “Old enough,” Bird replied lightly, waggling her fingers at him over one bare shoulder as she turned to go.

  Sam opened his mouth, closed it again.

  Bird disappeared into the darkness.

  He stood in the doorway, staring after her for a long time. He’d pay a call on Oralee Pringle first chance he got, he decided, but he had more in mind than returning the basket.

  CHAPTER TWO

  ESTEBAN VIERRA waited until well after nightfall before crossing the river from the Mexican side; he prided himself on his ability to move freely in the darkness, like a cat. Leaving his horse to graze on the bank, he made his way through the cottonwoods and thistly underbrush to the schoolhouse, pausing to admire the Ranger’s mount. The click of a pistol cylinder, somewhere behind him, made him freeze.

  It stung him, this chink in his prowess, and he felt more irritation than fear.

  “Hold your hands out from your sides,” a voice instructed.

  Vierra obeyed calmly. “O’Ballivan?” he asked.

  He heard the revolver slide back into the holster with a deftness that spoke volumes about the man at his back. “Yes.”

  He turned. “That’s a fine horse,” he said cordially. “I hope it’s fast.”

  O’Ballivan’s expression was grim, his craggy features defined by the play of light and shadow. “What are you doing here? My instructions were to meet you tomorrow night, on the other side of the river.”

  Vierra smiled. “I got curious,” he said.

  The Ranger parted with the briefest of grins, his teeth flashing white in the gloom. “You could have got dead,” he replied. “And if you’ve no better sense than to come prowling around another man’s horse in the night, this whole plan might need some review.”

  “Don’t you trust me?” Vierra asked, his aggrieved tone at some variance with his easy smile.

  “I don’t know you from Adam’s Aunt Bessie,” O’Ballivan responded, one hand still resting lightly on the butt of his revolver. “Of course I don’t trust you.”

  “That could be a problem. Maybe we ought to get better acquainted.”

  O’Ballivan looked him over
. “Maybe,” he said cautiously. “You’re Mexican. How is it that you don’t have an accent?”

  Vierra shrugged. “I think in Spanish,” he said. “And I do have an accent. I borrowed yours.”

  “What do you know about these outlaws we’re after?” O’Ballivan asked after a long and pensive silence.

  “Ah,” Vierra said, folding his arms. “You just said you don’t trust me. Why should I trust you?”

  “I don’t reckon you do,” O’Ballivan observed dryly.

  Vierra was pleased. Here was a worthy opponent, a rare phenomenon in his experience, one he could spar with. “I have been offered a very large reward, in gold, if I bring these banditos back to certain anxious rancheros in my country,” he said. Often, he’d discovered, a superficial truth was the most effective means of deception. It made most people complacent.

  Of course, O’Ballivan clearly wasn’t most people.

  “They’ve done plenty on this side of the border,” the Ranger said. “My orders are to turn them in to a certain federal judge in Tucson.”

  “Two men, working toward the same end, but with very different objectives,” Vierra allowed, still smiling. “Tell me—are the Americanos offering a bounty? Is that why you are doing this?”

  O’Ballivan shook his head. “A man I respect asked me to track the murdering bastards down and bring them in, dead or alive. That’s payment enough for me.”

  Vierra spread his hands. “Then there is no misunderstanding,” he said.

  “No misunderstanding at all,” O’Ballivan agreed. “Good night, Señor Vierra.”

  “You will be at the meeting place tomorrow night? The cantina in Refugio?”

  O’Ballivan, turning to go, paused to look back over one brawny shoulder and nod. “Tomorrow night,” he confirmed, and moved toward the schoolhouse.

  Vierra watched him out of sight, then gave a low whistle through his teeth. The Ranger’s horse came to him, and he stroked its fine neck with one hand before retreating into the darkness.

  * * *

  SAM ASSESSED HIS CROP of pupils as they filed obediently into the schoolroom the next morning and took their places without a word or a glance in his direction.