The Rustler

by Linda Lael Miller

  Sarah watched as Kitty gave Ephriam the tea, holding the cup to his lips, encouraging him, soft-voiced and patient, to drink. She was so intent on the scene that she didn’t hear Doc coming up the back stairs. He was beside her before she knew he was in the house, and she started.

  “What have we here?” he asked, seeing Kitty in the role of devoted nurse. Going by the look on his face, he, like Sarah, hadn’t recognized the woman for a few moments.

  “Kitty will explain,” Sarah said. “I’m due at the bank.”

  With that, she left the house.

  WYATT WAS WAITING on the spanking new platform at the depot when the train rolled in at midmorning. Folks leaving, folks coming in. Owen, who’d stayed behind at the house when he and Sarah left, sprang up like a bean shoot at his side.

  “Guess you must have seen to Lonesome,” Wyatt said easily.

  “Yep,” Owen confirmed cheerfully.

  “How’d you track me here?”

  “Most everybody comes to meet the train,” Owen said, shouting to be heard over the rattling, screeching din of the arriving locomotive, pulling no less than ten cars behind it. “I figured you’d be no different.”

  Wyatt chuckled, even though he was both dreading Rowdy’s return and eagerly awaiting it. If his brother didn’t get off this train, he was going to be mightily disappointed, and about equally relieved. “Good thinking,” he said. He recalled the boy saying he wished Wyatt was his father, back in Sarah’s kitchen, and felt a little choked up. He ruffled the boy’s hair just to have something to do.

  The train stopped, huffing steam, and folks dragged their bags and trunks up close, anxious to board. It was one of the curiosities of folks who rode such conveyances, to Wyatt’s mind, that they never wanted to wait and let the other people off first, so there’d be room for them.

  The conductor got off first, but Rowdy was right behind him, and then Sam. There was no sign of the women and babies, or Gideon, either.

  Wyatt drew a deep breath and waited to see what places things fell into.

  Owen stared up at the two men, big-eyed with admiration.

  Rowdy’s expression was unreadable, and so was Sam’s.

  They both nodded to Wyatt, then went to see to unloading their horses from a freight car down the line a ways. If they had trunks or valises, they must have meant to have them delivered or come back for them, because they didn’t slow their pace.

  “Was that the real marshal?” Owen asked, breathless.

  Wyatt felt a little jealous, what with Owen being so clearly taken with Rowdy. “Yes,” he said. “That’s the real marshal. He isn’t wearing a badge, so how did you know who he was?”

  “He’s famous,” Owen said. “I read all about him in a dime novel. There was a picture of him in the front.”

  So now Rowdy wasn’t just married to a beautiful woman who clearly adored him, wasn’t just the father of a handsome baby boy and the marshal of Stone Creek. He was famous.

  “You can’t believe everything you read,” Wyatt said. “Especially in those books.”

  “Are you in any of them?”

  “Not to my knowledge,” Wyatt said. The comparisons just kept on coming, and he fell short in every one of them. Not that he wanted to be immortalized in a dime novel, because he surely didn’t. Most of them belonged in outhouses, not libraries, along with last year’s mail-order catalog.

  He crossed the platform, descended the stairs at the side, and went to look on as Rowdy and Sam led their horses, already saddled, down a ramp from the freight car.

  When Rowdy finally broke down and spared a grin, Wyatt remembered how glad he was to see his brother.

  “What the hell happened to the jail?” Rowdy asked, affably enough.

  Wyatt explained how he’d locked up Paddy Paudeen’s gun, along with those of his cohorts, and they’d dynamited the place to get them back.

  Sam, already mounted, actually laughed. “Damn fools,” he said.

  “Where’s Lark?” Wyatt asked Rowdy.

  “She and Maddie are visiting friends in Phoenix for a day or so,” Rowdy said. “Gideon stayed to buy some duds for college. He’ll be along tomorrow, with Pardner.”

  “You still want work on my place?” Sam asked Wyatt.

  Apparently, they hadn’t found Billy Justice, or heard that Wyatt had been a part of the gang, however briefly.

  “Yes, sir,” Wyatt said. “I do.”

  “Ride out, when you’re ready, and I’ll show you around. And don’t call me ‘sir’ again. Name’s Sam.”

  Wyatt nodded, so relieved he couldn’t speak. He still had a job, a way to earn his keep, and Sarah’s, too, if she chose to marry him, until he had his own place ready. Like as not, she’d be reluctant, with her father so sick and the bank to run and the whole situation with Owen.

  He’d wait. Wait a thousand years if he had to.

  Sam said he’d better get on home and see if the place was still standing, and rode out.

  Rowdy led his horse, so he could walk alongside Wyatt and a still-gaping Owen.

  Wyatt introduced the boy.

  Rowdy grinned and they exchanged a handshake. “You mind taking my horse over to the livery stable for me?” he asked Owen. Most likely, he thought the barn had gone up in the blaze, too, being so close. He didn’t seem concerned about the house, though. Someone else, probably Doc, must have wired a little more information than Wyatt had given. “They’ll know what to do with him.”

  Owen was eager to comply. “Can I ride him?”

  Wyatt frowned. “Do you know how?” he asked.

  “Sure,” Owen said, proving his point by mounting Rowdy’s gelding. “I was on the polo team at one of my schools.”

  “I’ll be damned,” Wyatt muttered. “And here I thought you’d be more inclined to croquet.”

  “That’s a girl’s game,” Owen scoffed, from the saddle.

  Then he clicked his tongue and he and the gelding took off for the livery stable at a handsome trot.

  “Who is that kid?” Rowdy asked, amused. “He sure is a hand with a horse.”

  “He’s visiting Sarah Tamlin and her father,” Wyatt said. The news of Owen’s real relationship to the Tamlins wasn’t his to spread. “I’ve—” he stopped, cleared his throat. “I’ve been boarding over there, since the jail blew up.”

  Rowdy’s light blue eyes twinkled. “Is that so? Guess you meant what you said about courting Sarah.”

  “I meant it,” Wyatt affirmed seriously. “I bought a place, Rowdy. It used to belong to some folks named Henson.”

  Rowdy looked surprised, but pleased, too. “Hell of a wreck,” he said. “You’ll need some help fixing it up.”

  “I’ll be hard up for time, once I go to work for Sam O’Ballivan, which I mean to do, right away.”

  “I was hoping you’d stay,” Rowdy said, as they walked, heading by tacit agreement for what was left of the jailhouse. “If things went sour between you and Sarah, though, I figured you’d take to the trail. Now that you’ve bought land, well, that puts a different light on the matter.”

  “Did you catch up to those vigilantes?” Wyatt asked, then held his breath while he waited for his brother’s answer.

  Rowdy nodded. “Sam and I hauled them across from the Mexican side. They’re in jail in Tombstone. Lots of folks would just as soon see them turned loose, given that they hanged two members of the Justice gang and some saw that as a public service, but the law’s the law. Men can’t be taking it into their own hands.”

  “There was a gunfight here, Rowdy,” Wyatt said. “Three men died, and one of them was Carl Justice. I figure his older brother Billy will be along one of these days.”

  “Doc sent me a telegram right after it happened,” Rowdy said, confirming Wyatt’s earlier suspicion. Then his expression turned thoughtful. “You knew one of the Justice boys?” he asked.

  It was uncertain ground. Wyatt trod it carefully. “I was on the wrong side of the law most of my life, Rowdy,” he said. “I k
now a lot of outlaws.”

  “I was, too,” Rowdy reminded him. “But I never crossed paths with Billy Justice and his bunch. You think Billy will be drawn to Stone Creek because his brother died here?”

  “No doubt in my mind,” Wyatt said grimly.

  They’d reached the jailhouse now. Rowdy surveyed the ruins and gave a low whistle of exclamation.

  “I guess I shouldn’t have locked up those guns,” Wyatt said.

  “I would have done the same thing,” Rowdy told him, raising his eyes to the little house behind the burned-out jail. “At least the house and barn didn’t go. Lark would be plenty riled if she lost that big-city bathtub of hers.”

  Wyatt chuckled. “It’s a fine piece of equipment,” he said. “I used it once.” That was the extent of his confiding; he wasn’t about to add that Sarah had bathed there, too. She’d already laundered the dress she’d borrowed from Lark, and Wyatt had returned it to its place in the wardrobe.

  “You’re welcome to the tub, Wyatt,” Rowdy said.

  “I owe you for groceries,” Wyatt answered. “You going after Paudeen and the others? Because I’ll go with you if you do.”

  Rowdy shook his head. “If they come back on their own, we’ll deal with them. If they stay clear, so much the better.”

  They went inside the house, Rowdy in the lead. Rowdy hung his hat on a peg next to the door, and Wyatt followed suit.

  “If I could have the use of Sugarfoot until I get another horse,” he said, “I’d be obliged.”

  Rowdy nodded, took the coffeepot off the stove, and carried it to the sink to rinse and fill. After adding ground beans to the basket, he set the works on the stove and built a fire under it.

  They left the door open, on account of the heat.

  “Tell me what you know about the Justice boys,” Rowdy said.

  “Not much,” Wyatt answered, and that was true as far as it went. He’d ridden with them for less than a month, helped them set up the rustling of those five hundred cattle, but neither he nor Billy were the sort to exchange confidences around a campfire. “They’ve done some rustling, and Billy’s got a reputation for being hotheaded and vengeful as a wildcat caught in a swarm of bees.” He paused, cleared his throat again. “Rowdy, if a man was with somebody when they were fixing to steal cattle, but hadn’t gotten around to doing it yet, would he be guilty of a crime?”

  Rowdy, busy with his coffee-brewing before, stopped and looked so deep into Wyatt that he’d have sworn he felt his brother’s gaze clear to his backbone. “I guess that depends on whether or not the cattle in question were still on the land where they belonged, and if anybody got shot trying to stop the rustlers.”

  Wyatt said nothing. He was dizzy with relief. They’d rounded up the cattle on an apparently deserted ranch owned by a family named Donagher. No one had come forward to prevent the rustling, and as far as he knew, nobody had been hurt, either.

  “But what if a man intended to steal cattle?”

  “There’s no law against intending to do something,” Rowdy said. Wyatt could almost see wheels turning behind those Yarbro-blue eyes. “It’s the following through that matters.”

  Wyatt let out his breath.

  “Are you telling me that you were with the Justice gang when they went after the Donagher herd and riled up the neighboring ranchers?”

  “What if I am?”

  “If you are, Billy Justice probably will come after you. I’ll stand with you if he does.”

  “He’ll come,” Wyatt said.

  “We’ll be ready,” Rowdy replied.

  Wyatt unpinned his badge, laid it on the table. He was surprised by the regret he felt, letting it go. For a little while, he’d stood for the same values as the nickel-plated star, much as he’d botched things.

  “Thanks,” he said. And he wasn’t just talking about his brief stint as a deputy.

  Rowdy nodded. “I guess you’ll be heading out to Sam’s now.”

  “Yep,” Wyatt said, walking to the door, taking his hat down off the peg.

  The coffee was beginning to perk, but he was too restless to stay around swilling the stuff. He wanted a look at Stone Creek Ranch, needed to map out his duties in his mind.

  Owen was still at the livery stable when he went to claim Sugarfoot. He’d finagled himself a quarter’s worth of work by offering to muck out stalls.

  “I’m going to buy a couple of dime novels with this money,” he told Wyatt proudly.

  Wyatt grinned as he went into Sugarfoot’s stall and set about saddling him up. “Seems like a waste to me,” he said, “but I guess it’s better than rock candy to rot your teeth.”

  Some of the shine had gone off Owen when he realized what Wyatt was doing. “You leavin’?” he asked. He was already picking up the Western vernacular, for better or worse, dropping his g’s and shortening sentences to pertinent words. “For good?”

  Wyatt swung up into the saddle. “No,” he said.

  “Where’s your badge?”

  “Gave it back to Rowdy.”

  Owen sagged a little. “Oh.”

  Wyatt rode past the kid, out into the sunlight.

  “Where you headed?” Owen called after him. “Can I go along?”

  Wyatt reined in, turned Sugarfoot, and looked the boy in the eye. “You’ve got to earn that quarter you told me about,” he said. “I’m going to Stone Creek Ranch, to see about a job.”

  Owen looked relieved. “Can I go some other time?”

  “Some other time,” Wyatt agreed.

  Parts of his heart were light as he turned his horse back in the direction of Sam O’Ballivan’s ranch, but parts of it were heavy, too.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  SAM O’BALLIVAN’S SPREAD WAS something to behold, sprawling across a broad and shallow valley the way it did, with a creek running through so the cattle would have fresh water all year long. There were two houses, both sizable and some distance apart, and one good barn, with what looked like a bunkhouse behind it, and a small cabin beyond that.

  Wyatt felt his spirits rise at this reminder of what a man could do, could build and sustain, if he worked hard and played the cards he’d been dealt. He began to see his own hardscrabble little place as it might be, one day.

  To the east, he saw Sam’s herd, grazing in a high meadow. There must have been a thousand cattle, and he counted five wranglers on horseback, driving strays back to the main bunch.

  For the length of a heartbeat, Wyatt was back on the Donagher place, outside Haven, with the storm coming on and the stampede still in his future, and even though the sky was clear and china-blue, he felt the same inexorable sense of dread he had then.

  He shook it off. That had been a different time and a different place.

  Seeing Sam come out of the barn, Wyatt rode down off the rise toward him.

  O’Ballivan, wearing work clothes, with his sleeves rolled up, and manure-caked boots, greeted him with a half smile.

  “Only five men tending a herd that big?” Wyatt asked, without meaning to. He swung down off Sugarfoot’s sweaty back, and he and Sam shook hands.

  “Bunch of yahoos,” Sam allowed. “All of them still green as the first corn crop. I don’t think one of them is over seventeen. Most of my hands quit on me to go mining for copper down around Bisbee.”

  The youth, inexperience and limited number of the crew explained, at least partially, why a man like Sam would hire somebody he didn’t really know for a foreman, even on the word of a good friend like Rowdy. Wyatt’s own experience with cattle was pretty much limited to stealing them—he’d done that when he was young, given the uncertain pecuniary nature of the train-robbing business—but it was work any halfway competent man could do, long as he had some stamina and could sit a horse.

  “I’ll show you to your quarters,” Sam said, starting off toward the cabin. “You’ll take your meals in the bunkhouse, or with Maddie and me if she’s of a mind to cook on any given day.” He spared another smile at this, gone as quick as it
came. Sam O’Ballivan, Wyatt concluded, wasn’t the effusive type. “You’ll have a string of six horses to choose from, Sundays off unless there’s a need to stay on here for some reason, and you’ll get extra wages for that. Your job is to ride herd over the cowpokes, more than the cattle. If you can round up any spare help, I’d be glad to hire them on, too. In a month or so, we’ll have some culling to do, and we’ll drive the critters to the railway, a few miles east of Stone Creek, and load them into cattle cars. They’ll be sold in Phoenix, and after that, you can take a week or two off if you’re so inclined. Winter’s mostly taken up keeping the bulls and heifers and calves alive. The wolves get hungry around that time of year, so we’ll be on the lookout for them. Job involves some ice-breaking, too, when the creek freezes, and driving wagonloads of hay out to the pastures. We use dray horses and flatbed sleighs when the snow gets deep. It’s cold, hard work, but there’s a lot of free time for sitting around the stove, too.”

  Wyatt took all this in, surprised by none of it. He was thinking of his own little spread, and how he’d spend his Sundays there, driving nails and digging out the well.

  A smile touched his mouth. His ma surely wouldn’t have approved of his working on the Sabbath Day, but to Wyatt’s way of thinking, it would be a holy labor. Where he’d fit Sarah into all this, he didn’t know.

  They reached the cabin, a sturdy-looking little house, obviously new, with glass and even curtains at the windows. Inside, Wyatt found the accommodations more than satisfactory. There was a sink with a hand-pump, a big freestanding copper bathtub, a stove so new the chrome fenders still gleamed, a table with two chairs, and a wide bed with what looked like a decent mattress. The floor wasn’t plain, hard-packed dirt, like it would be in many such places, but smoothly planed planks. There was even a private outhouse, newly built, and a lean-to for firewood. The shelves were stocked with canned goods, should the foreman choose to eat alone, and pots and pans were provided, along with a blue enamel coffeepot and some mismatched cups and plates. Quilts and good sheets lay neatly folded at the foot of the bed.

  The place was a palace to a man who’d slept on the ground or on a prison cot so many nights. But Sarah would find it only slightly more habitable than the shack on his land, most probably.