Paper Sheriff

by Short, Luke;

  That night they approached Reese’s new line shack on Lime Creek and, as Reese had calculated, Ames Tolliver with two of the crew had finished their slow drive of a good part of the Slash Seven cattle to summer range. As Reese and Jen crossed the park through the scattered cows with their alert and curious calves, they saw that the lamps had been lighted in the line shack against the lowering dusk. The clatter of their shod horses crossing the rocky stream bed brought Ames Tolliver to the bunkhouse doorway.

  Reese was momentarily puzzled. Why was a lamp burning in the room next to the old bunkhouse? Probably Ames had busied himself carpentering inside and had forgotten the lamp.

  Across the Creek Jen reined in and surveyed the new building, still yellow and unweathered against the dark seasoned logs of the old bunkhouse.

  “Why, Reese, you call this a line shack? It’s a small house really.”

  “When I quit sheriffing, this will be where we live most of the summer. A kitchen and bedroom are all we need.”

  Ames had started toward them and Jen, riding astride, swung out of the saddle, her divided skirt billowing before her foot touched the ground. Reese was leaning forward, his right foot already free of the stirrup when the door to the end room opened, making a dragging sound on the puncheon floor that made him look up.

  Callie stepped into the doorway.

  Reese slacked back in the saddle, stunned into immobility.

  It was Jen who found her wits first. “Why, Callie,” she called pleasantly. “Reese didn’t tell me you’d be here.”

  Callie stepped out into the dusk, walking toward them, and now Reese swung out of the saddle, trying and failing to hide his confusion. Why in God’s name was Callie here? She couldn’t have known that he and Jen planned to stop here, or even that they were together.

  Callie was close enough now so that Reese could see the surprise and anger on her narrow little face. She halted, smiled thinly and said, “Hello, Jen. Reese couldn’t have told you because he didn’t know.”

  The two women looked at each other, freshly appraising a situation that surprised them both. Callie’s face as Reese read it held an angry wariness he had become accustomed to lately. Jen’s face reflected her court-room training; it was composed and held a formal cordiality and only its faint flush, probably unnoticed by Callie, betrayed her embarrassment.

  Reese said easily, “Curiosity always conquers, doesn’t it?” To Jen he said, “Callie hadn’t seen the line shack either.”

  Callie looked at him and said with a quiet defiance, “A house has to have something in it, doesn’t it?”

  Reese turned then to Ames who had halted beside Callie. “How did it go, Ames?”

  “A two-day loaf,” Ames said. Now he touched the brim of his hat, greeting Jen. “How are you, Miss Truro?”

  “Tired and hungry,” Jen said cheerfully.

  “Mrs. Branham will fix that,” Ames said. “She had us throw a couple of mattresses and some kitchen gear in the chuck wagon.” To Reese he said, “Take a look at how it’s rigged, Reese. I’ll turn your horses out.”

  Callie said, “Yes, you’d be surprised what three men can do in a day, Reese. Come and look.”

  The worst was over, Reese thought, but there were plenty of questions unanswered because as yet they were unasked. Callie turned and led Jen into the cabin while Reese followed. How was he going to explain Jen’s presence to Callie? He wasn’t going to explain anything, he decided abruptly. County business would cover it, and he knew that Jen would say nothing until he gave her her cue.

  The room they entered was kitchen and living room. Reese saw immediately that in passing through Bale Callie had picked up a small new stove which was set up now in the rear corner. The rocking chair that sat under the cottonwood by the kitchen at Slash Seven now rested in the opposite corner. When Reese saw the deal table and its four stump seats he guessed that the chuck wagon had detoured far enough to pass the saw mill on the way here.

  Jen made appropriate comments and then Callie showed them the other room. The crew had cut and peeled poles to make two bedframes, which were now nailed to each far corner. New rope laced securely to the frames held the two mattresses the chuck wagon had brought. There were even blankets and pillows on the beds. The two windows were installed and curtained.

  As Callie was explaining where the dresser and the curtained closet would go, Reese looked at the two women. Callie was wearing one of his cast-off shirts and a pair of his discarded trousers, pants legs rolled up. In contrast to Jen, whose blouse and divided skirt had style of her own making, Callie looked like a small, tough little waif. Well, these were the women in his life, he thought. He possessed neither, and neither possessed him.

  He waited until Callie had finished, then said, “You’ve fancied it up, Callie. If you do any more, we’ll have to give it a name, like those Englishmen do up in Wyoming.”

  “No. You have to be a remittance man to do that. A milord’s naughty son.”

  Callie looked at the two of them in puzzlement, not understanding their talk and resenting the fact that she didn’t.

  Reese said then, watching Jen, “What are you going to assess us, Jen?” Jen waited for more and then Reese said to Callie, “Jen’s helping out the assessor, Callie.”

  Jen caught it then and said, “Not really, Callie. It was an excuse to get away from the court-house. There’s a new store and stage stop up here that I have to look at. It just happens that old Mr. Barnes hates to ride and I love it.”

  Callie nodded indifferently, then said, “I’ll get supper now on my new stove.”

  They returned to the kitchen and Reese moved outside, leaving the two women together. He hadn’t exactly lied about Jen helping out old Barnes. There was a new store and saloon and stage station up on the Pass road which Barnes had never seen and the County had never taxed. When Barnes had learned that Jen was going to take a few days off and ride in the Wheelers, he had asked her to appraise the store so that it could be entered on the tax rolls.

  But why did he care what Callie believed? Reese thought.

  He saw Ames cross the creek on the two-log bridge and moved toward him, their blanket rolls under his arms. Ames came up to him and halted, dumping the blanket rolls aside, and even in this light Reese could see the quiet twinkle in his blue eyes that was magnified by his thick glasses.

  “Kind of surprised you, didn’t it?” Ames asked.

  Reese smiled and nodded. “You two were plotting behind my back.”

  Ames laughed softly. “Well, I asked her if she wanted anything took up here and it looks like she did.”

  Reese nodded. “Home tomorrow?”

  “For sure.”

  “Why don’t you three split up on your way home, Ames? That way you can cover more country. Stay high all morning and look for anything branded R-Cross.”

  “That brand still bothering you?”

  “More than you know,” Reese said wryly.

  “We’ll look,” Ames said quietly.

  Supper conversation was an awkward thing that Reese and Jen had to carry. Callie had no small talk and Reese realized that she and Jen literally had nothing in common except himself. Isolated at the Slash Seven and at the Hoad relatives, Callie knew nothing of town talk, and court-house talk had always bored her. Blessedly, Jen dipped into the fund of court-room and lawyer stories garnered from listening to her father, and Callie, against her will, found herself smiling at some of them; the smile, however, was only face deep for whenever she looked at Jen, it seemed to Reese that the naked hatred showed.

  After supper Reese pretended business with the crew and escaped to the bunkhouse, leaving Callie and Jen to clean up the dishes. However, before Reese went out it was settled that he would sleep in the bunkhouse, leaving the bedroom for the women.

  Jen was truly tired and the prospect of spending the night with Callie appalled her. She could not blame Reese for this most awkward of situations, but she was angry and therefore silent during the cleaning up. />
  “Finished?” Jen said to Callie. “I’m exhausted, Callie. I think it’s bed for me.”

  “For both of us,” Callie said.

  Jen took with her the blanket roll that Reese had brought in and went into the dark bedroom, quickly undressed and slipped into her nightdress. When Callie came in moments later with the lantern, Jen was already between the blankets. She had her face turned to the wall, but she could not pretend that she was already asleep. She said, “Goodnight, Callie.”

  “Not yet.”

  Something in Callie’s tone of voice made Jen turn over to face her. Callie had placed the lantern on the floor and was now sitting on the edge of the other bed.

  “I think it’s time we talked,” Callie said coldly.

  “About what?”

  “About what!” Callie flared. “My husband rides in here with another woman that he planned to sleep with tonight like he slept with her last night—and you ask about what!”

  Jen said calmly, “I slept in the Prescotts’ bedroom last night while Reese slept in the bunkhouse. I suppose I was going to sleep in this room tonight while Reese slept in the bunkhouse again.”

  “That’s probably true,” Callie said, and her voice was snide. “You very likely sleep together so often that this isn’t any occasion. You claim I’m wrong?”

  “I won’t bother to,” Jen said wearily.

  “You’re in love with him. Do you deny that?”

  “No. I guess it shows.”

  “You want all the pleasures of a man without any of his trouble.”

  Jen sat up now and put her back against the wall, folding her arms across her breast. Her voice held an amusement as she said, “You’re feeling abused, aren’t you, Callie? I wish I could be abused by being married to Reese.”

  “Then keep on wishing,” Callie said softly, viciously. “It won’t do you any good.”

  “Oh, I’ve accepted that.”

  “Not really you haven’t,” Callie countered, triumph in her voice. “You can have him at a dance out in the dark or some hayloft or some empty line camp, but that isn’t the same thing as having him with a wedding ring on your finger, is it?”

  “You’ve got a wedding ring on your finger, but you haven’t had him much, have you?” Jen said cruelly.

  Callie’s sallow face flushed with anger. “You’re guessing, and you’re guessing wrong!”

  Jen went on relentlessly, “Then where are your children?”

  “I can’t have any!” Callie shouted.

  “Not if your husband won’t take you to bed.”

  “You sneaking bitch!” The fury in her voice almost choked Callie.

  “I’m as much of a bitch as most women, Callie, but I’m not the greedy, heartless one you are, nor the cunning one.”

  “So you aren’t cunning?” Callie countered angrily. “Enough to steal a woman’s husband, so that’s not cunning?”

  “I wouldn’t steal him to get his good name or to share his prosperity or to have him provide for me. That takes a special kind of low cunning.”

  “That’s a lie! I love him.”

  “Is that what you tell yourself? Or do you tell yourself that you let him love you so you could get his name and his money?”

  “I didn’t!” Callie said furiously.

  “If you care nothing about his money, why don’t you divorce him?”

  “So you can have it?”

  “I imagine Reese would leave you half of it.”

  Callie’s anger pushed her to her feet. “Let him try!” she shouted. “I’m Mrs. Reese Branham and I will be until the day I die!”

  “Then why are we talking?” Jen asked quietly. When Callie didn’t answer immediately, she said, “I’m tired, Callie. Mostly tired of you. What is it you wanted to say to me anyway?”

  “That I won’t divorce Reese and that he can’t divorce me!”

  “I already knew that. Now I know it again,” Jen said. “Goodnight, Callie.” She slipped down between the blankets and turned her back to the lantern and Callie.

  When Reese came in for breakfast, it took just about two minutes to guess that something had happened last night between the two women. At the table they both talked with him but not with each other.

  Halfway through breakfast Callie asked him casually, “Where are you two going from here on your honeymoon, Reese?”

  Reese studied her spiteful little face for a long moment, then his glance shifted to Jen. Slowly he rose, went over to the door, lifted his hat from its nail and went out.

  The crew was already down out at the corral, harnessing the mule to the chuck wagon and catching their own mounts. He headed for the bridge now, and he was more curious than angry. Something between Jen and Callie last night had come to a head, else Callie would never have uttered this jibe. In their past quarrels Callie had never gone so far as to accuse him and Jen of being lovers, but now she had done it openly to both of them. If she dared to do it to their faces, she would make the same accusation behind their backs to anyone, he reasoned.

  He caught his and Jen’s horses and saddled them, while Walt and Sam rode out. Afterwards, he yarned with Ames by the chuck wagon until Jen, alone, crossed the bridge and joined them. Once mounted, Reese set out south and Jen said, “I thought we were keeping north today, Reese.”

  “We are. When we’re out of sight of Callie, we’ll circle back.”

  “Of course.”

  “What happened between you two last night?”

  Jen looked sidelong at him now and grimaced. “A woman’s shrieking, name-calling fight. I’m not very proud of myself this morning, Reese.”

  “Want to talk about it?”

  “Why not? It was over you.” She hesitated. “She started out by accusing us of being lovers. Then I said some cruel things in return.”

  “Like what? You’re not cruel.”

  “I was last night. I said she couldn’t get you as her lover even if she wore your wedding ring.”

  “You’d only know that from me,” Reese said.

  “That’s what was so cruel, and I pushed it. I asked her why if this was so she didn’t divorce you. I told her I thought you’d give her half your belongings to be free.”

  “I’ve told her that.”

  “She ended by saying she’d be Mrs. Reese Branham until the day she died.”

  Reese said grimly, “She’s a Hoad, Jen.”

  “But the Hoads are greedy. If they’re doing what you think they’re doing, it’s for money, isn’t it? Half of what you own would be a fortune to any of them and to Callie too.”

  “There’s more to it than that, Jen. I’ve hurt Callie’s pride by not being a husband to her. Still I guess my name gives a little tone to her sorry one. I’ve my grandfather and father to thank for that.”

  “Have you ever thought she could get a child by another man and its last name would be Branham?”

  “That’s one thing she’ll never do, Jen, and for a very good reason. I’d know it wasn’t mine. That would be the grounds for the divorce she won’t give me now.”

  “Of course, you’re right. I wasn’t thinking.”

  They fell silent now. They were approaching the edge of the park and once in its timber, they would circle the line shack. It was a clear, sweet-smelling, sunny morning, but Reese felt no lift of his spirit and no appreciation for this fine day. There was more misery in store for Jen and he must tell her.

  “Jen, you’d better set yourself for some mighty ugly talk from Callie. She’s out in the open about us now.”

  Jen glanced at him and, oddly, she smiled. “How little you know about women. She won’t open her mouth.”

  Reese scowled. “She already has, this morning.”

  “To us, only to us,” Jen said. “She’ll never say it to anyone else.”

  “To hurt us, wouldn’t she?”

  Jen shook her head emphatically. “No woman would admit publicly that another woman has got her husband. That’s admitting her own failure.”
r />   Reese smiled faintly. “Now it’s my turn not to think.”

  They entered the timber and Reese reined in, Jen doing the same. “Where do we go today, Reese?”

  “The Bashears usually have fifty to sixty head of trading horses. I didn’t see them below, so I’m guessing they’ve made a deal with Ty for his Copper Canyon grass. We’ll go there, then keep north. That’s rough country, but it could hide a herd. We should be at the new stage station before dark. I got it from Joe Early that they have rooms. If they’re full, the woman—what’s her name?”

  “Armistead.”

  “She’ll likely make room for you. Tomorrow night you’ll be home, and I’ll head south for the high country by myself. There are more Hoad kin down in that corner of the county.”

  They climbed steadily through the morning, riding single file in the timber, Reese in the lead. At mid-day they found an open park fed by a seep. Here they let their horses graze while they ate their sandwiches Jen had prepared for them earlier. By unspoken agreement they didn’t talk more of their wretched predicament with Callie. Privately Reese regretted that Callie’s quarrel with Jen had taken place. True, it cleared the air and drew the battle lines, but to what purpose? It had humiliated Jen unnecessarily and gained Callie nothing; again nothing was changed.

  Jen had stretched out on the grass in the shade and was napping and Reese, watching her, wondered what was ahead for them. A question from either of them would make them lovers, but that was no solution. It would place Jen in a cruel and impossible situation, denying her the true womanhood that was her right. Maybe the solution was for him to pull his stakes and leave the country. That, he knew, was the coward’s way, the selfish way, and would solve nothing. Besides, he would not be chased from his home, from his land and from his friends by a scheming woman who, to be fair about it, could not help herself. He had helped make her what she was, and she was as unhappy about what life had dealt her as he was about what life had dealt him. No, there was no solution.