Crazy Woman Creek

by Welch, Virginia

  “On the ground.”

  “Harold, the deputy wants the truth.” Octavius grabbed the child by the chin and forced him to look up into his face. “I’ll double your whipping if you don’t tell Deputy Davies exactly where you found that watch.”

  “That is the truth, pa. I found it on the ground. I saw the gold chain sticking out by that German lady’s grave, and I pulled it, and up came the watch.”

  Luke hardly heard the child. He had stopped listening. While Octavius handed his son a handkerchief, Luke stood and turned, stroking the puppy through his corduroy coat and gazing silently toward the eastern edge of Buffalo, where Main Street ended and the short ride to the church began.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  “Mrs. Rose, looky,” Ben Slocomb said, his arm gesturing west.

  Lenora clutched the wire handle of the egg basket at her side and shaded her eyes with her free hand, looking westward to the Big Horn Mountains. Two men on horseback, possibly more—it was hard to tell from the distance and the angle—were riding toward her ranch. The early morning sun shed dazzling white light over the frosty prairie, making the riders appear more shimmery than distinct.

  “They don’t look like they’re in a hurry. Probably not Indians,” said Ben, shading his eyes too and squinting.

  “No,” agreed Lenora, her eyes trained on the riders. “I’m going to fetch James’ rifle, his Colt too, just the same.”

  “Bring the rifle out to me, Mrs. Rose. You stay in the house with the Colt.”

  Lenora nodded and walked quickly toward the house. In less than a minute she returned with her Sharps and a leather pouch of ammunition, both of which she thrust into Ben’s hands. She lingered a moment longer to scrutinize the riding party, but the horsemen were still too far away to make out.

  “Best get inside now. I’ll talk to ‘em for you, Miz Rose.”

  Lenora thanked Ben and hurried to the house. She felt uncomfortable leaving one so young as Ben outside, alone, to meet the strangers. But it wouldn’t do to endanger her unborn child. Once inside she started to bolt the front door then thought better of it. Ben might need to get inside quickly to defend himself. She moved to the bedroom window, still gripping the Colt, watching the dark blot to the west slowly become larger and more distinct, though she still could not identify the riders.

  As she gazed across the prairie at the horsemen, a thought seeped like ice water into her mind, chilling her to the bottom of her soul. She’d stood at this same window more than six months ago, watching horsemen approach her property bearing the worst news of her life. As the memory washed over her, strangely, no tears threatened. Instead, a squeezing sensation bore down on her chest and she felt sick to her stomach. She gripped the window sill to keep from collapsing onto the floor.

  Still clinging to the window sill for support, she saw Ben walk around the corner of the house, evidently having decided it was best to take the lead and walk out to greet the visitors. As she watched Ben approach them—she could see now that there were four riders—one of the forward men dismounted, handed his reins to another rider, and started walking toward Ben. When she saw Ben reach out and shake the man’s hand, some of the tension drained from her. Ben talked with the tall man but she did not recognize him. After a few minutes Ben took the reins of the man’s horse and began to lead it away, the three other riders following. The tall man started on foot toward the house.

  Feeling more at ease but full of wonder, Lenora sat down on the edge of the bed to ease her roiling stomach. When the sickness passed she got up again, looked into the mirror above the dresser and smoothed her hair, and then removed her big work apron. She placed the Colt back in her underwear drawer where she had taken to storing it since James disappeared. She was covering up the gun with lacy underthings when she heard a loud rap rap rap in the front room.

  #

  “Deputy Davies,” said Lenora as she opened the door, its hinge creaking from the cold. “I am so surprised to see you. We thought you would be delayed indefinitely at Fort Laramie.”

  “Ma’am,” said Luke, touching the tip of his hat. “I had business to take care of here in Buffalo.”

  “Yes,” said Lenora, absently, incredulous that Deputy Davies was actually standing on her front porch. Somewhere in the back forty of her mind she realized that Ben and the others were nowhere in sight. She perceived, as if she were outside herself watching this scene instead of participating in it, that something very dramatic was about to take place.

  Luke paused, looking somber, eyes filled with pain. After an awkward second he spoke. “We found your husband’s body, Mrs. Rose. Could you please come out? To the porch?”

  Lenora nodded mutely. She shut the door, walked to the bedroom and picked up the gray woolen shawl that she had thrown on the bed in her haste to retrieve James’ Colt. She wrapped it around her shoulders and returned to the front room. She opened the front door feeling as though she were moving through a dream. Luke stood politely by, waiting for her to seat herself on the backless bench. Once she was seated he sat down beside her. He removed his hat and held it, his elbows on his knees. He was sitting so close that Lenora could smell the woodsy smoke of evening campfires that clung to his thick corduroy coat and brown pants. She had foreseen this moment a thousand times in her dark imaginings. Now that it was here, she was beset by an otherworldly calm, though her physical senses were sharpened by the knowledge of his nearness. All was still. The ice blue chambray skirting of her dress flowed around the bench like a frozen waterfall.

  “Someone murdered your husband, Mrs. Rose,” Luke began, turning to Lenora and looking into her eyes. “We found his body buried in Christian Ebenezer’s cemetery. He had been shot through the head. Based on the condition of the body, we figure he was killed the night he left or very near that time. Whoever did it hid his body in Aleida Aeschelmen’s grave.”

  “She died only two weeks before he went missing.” Lenora’s voice was barely audible, as if she spoke from someplace deep inside herself.

  “Someone took advantage of the ground being broken up, the grave being new and all. Yesterday me and Cyrus, Reverend Thomas, and Octavius Dunn, we started digging. His body was lying on top of her casket. No one could have known just by looking that there were two bodies buried in there.”

  “How can you be certain it was my husband?”

  “Cyrus and Reverend Thomas recognized the clothes, boots too. And this.” Luke reached into his pocket. When he pulled out his hand again he opened his palm. In the center was a small gold ring.

  Lenora reached out and took it. She looked at the ring a few seconds, closed her hand around it, and let both hands fall to her lap softly, defeated. After a few seconds of tense silence, she seemed to come back to the moment. She turned to Luke.

  “If there was no evidence to see at the cemetery, how did you know to dig there?”

  Luke’s head fell then, his gaze turning from her face to his knees. Slowly he put a hand into his coat pocket and pulled out the gold watch. With his other hand he took one of hers and placed the watch in it, closing his hand over hers and holding it gently. Then he looked into her wondering eyes.

  “Mrs. Rose, I have to ask you to forgive me. Octavius Dunn’s little boy found this watch two months ago. He brought it to the office. Told me he found it at the church. Cyrus and I looked all over the church grounds for anything that might lead us to the body. We found nothing, but that’s no excuse for not bringing you this before now.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  Luke swallowed. “I figured you’d be awfully upset to see this. It bothered me to think you were still grieving over him. I shouldn’t have kept it back.”

  Lenora pulled her hand away from his and lifted the watch near her chest, turning it over in her hand. She opened it, ran her fingers along the smooth round edge of the glass face. After a few seconds she shut it with a click and turned back to Luke.

  “I wish you had shown me this before now, Deputy Davies,”
she said softly. “His grandfather gave it to him. He was his grandfather’s namesake, you know. He was closer to his grandfather than his own father. If I’d known you had this, I would have known with certainty that my husband was dead. James would never have parted with it.” There was no anger in her tone, only poignant regret.

  Luke shut his eyes and sighed. “I’ve been very selfish. I am very sorry,” he repeated. “This has cost both of us, but mostly you.”

  Lenora put her hand on top of his. “I forgive you,” she said, and then she removed her hand.

  Luke nodded a thank-you. They sat in heavy silence a minute, then Luke spoke again. “Yesterday when I rode into town, Dunn met me with his boy. The kid lied about the exact location of the watch because he didn’t want us to find the owner. He wanted to keep what he’d found. Earlier he had told me he found it on the church steps. I learned only late yesterday that he found it in the cemetery by Aleida Aeschelman’s grave. That’s when I figured out where to start digging.”

  “I see.”

  A horse neighed from the direction of the barn, reminding Lenora that Luke had ridden from town with three others. “The other men—who came with you?”

  “Cyrus, Octavius, and Reverend Thomas. They’re tending to their horses while they wait for me. I told them I wanted to give you the news myself.”

  “Thank you, Deputy Davies. I appreciate your concern for my feelings.”

  They sat a while longer in silence, only the occasional rooster’s crowing or cow’s mooing from the barn interrupting their thoughts. Lenora was surprised at how well she was taking this news. But then, for so long all evidence, or at least what little she had, pointed to this, that James was dead. In a way, Deputy Davies’ news was almost a relief, as if today, for the first time in months, she could stop holding her breath.

  In the next moment Lenora idly wondered what the men were doing to occupy themselves. Even Ben was intentionally staying out of sight. By now, she surmised, he should be finished with morning chores and mounting his horse to return to his parents’ place. Then, in the long silence, after a while she began to wonder why Deputy Davies seemed so absorbed in his thoughts, as if he hadn’t said all he meant to say and was reluctant to speak. She decided to break the tension.

  “Do you have any idea who killed him?”

  “No. I have only pieces of the puzzle. What’s more, after seeing where his body was hidden, I’ve changed my mind about Sam Wright.”

  “Oh?”

  “He’s too sick and frail to get a body from the North-East Creek to the church site, then buried. Someone else may have helped him. I can’t be sure.”

  “You think there are two people involved?” Lenora cast about in her mind what such a scenario could mean. She came up blank.

  “Either that or Sam had nothing to do with it.”

  “But why? Why kill my husband?”

  “That question will be answered once we find the killer. Cyrus thinks I’m out of my tree, but I’ve suspected from the first that the killer is the same person who’s been bothering you around here.” Luke ran his hands through his hair and looked around the yard, sweeping his eyes as though searching for some missed clue. “You told me the trespasser first came around the Sunday night after your husband disappeared, but you didn’t come to town with the news till the next day. I’ve a mind to believe that the person or persons who killed your husband felt safe coming after you because he knew your husband was out of the way—that he was already dead. No one else knew you were alone.”

  “But that problem stopped when you locked up Sam.”

  “Someone could be using that fact for his own purposes.”

  Then, with no preamble, Luke reached for Lenora’s hand again. His hand was large and warm, his touch gentle and affectionate as he covered hers. But when he spoke his tone was urgent, laced with intense feeling.

  “Mrs. Rose, I once told you that any man would be proud to be the father of your child. I’ve been thinking since then that maybe I was not plain enough in my speaking.”

  Lenora’s eyes grew wide.

  “Your child needs a father, and you’d have fewer problems if you had a husband around. I ask you to let me be that man.” Luke took his other hand and placed it under hers. With both of his big hands cupped around her small one, he waited.

  Lenora looked down at his hands and then up again, into his face, her eyes soft with affection. She saw love and deep longing, causing a wellspring of sharp, mixed emotions to bubble up inside her. She knew she felt grateful for Deputy Davies’ help, and clearly he was fond of her, but did she love him?

  “I will consider your offer, Deputy Davies.”

  “It’s Luke.”

  “Luke,” she said. Then she smiled a small, guarded smile.

  Luke removed his hands from hers and leaned back a little on the bench. “How did it go with Judge Stillman?”

  “It didn’t. He was delayed at Fort Douglas. I went to town with Mrs. Nolan to speak to him on the day he was supposed to conduct hearings at Fort McKinney, but he didn’t appear. All that angst for nought,” she said, shaking her head in remembrance.

  “It doesn’t matter, anyway. Before God and man, this property is yours now. The government can’t take it.”

  “Almost mine, that is true,” though it gave Lenora less comfort than she would have thought, considering the news of her husband she’d just received.

  “Speaking of Mrs. Nolan,” said Luke, standing to his feet and putting on his hat, “Where is she?”

  “In town.” Lenora stood then too, facing him.

  Something dark flashed in Luke’s eyes. “Since when?”

  “Yesterday afternoon. I’ve been doing so well lately that I suggested she take a few days at home. Visit with her son. She didn’t argue. Malcolm came for her before supper.”

  “Lenora,” he said, using her given name for the first time. It tasted like a poem in his mouth. “You shouldn’t be out here alone. It’s not safe.”

  “You are right. I shouldn’t be alone. I shouldn’t be a widow, either.”

  Luke sighed gustily. “I want you to come back to town with us, stay at the Occidental, at least until Mrs. Nolan can accompany you back here.”

  “I will not leave my ranch.” Lenora’s tone was controlled, but her mouth tightened into an I’d-like-to-see-you-try-and-make-me straight line.

  Luke put his hands on his hips and frowned. “Why? Why do you insist on staying out here alone when there are Indians and cattle rustlers and, if your story is to be believed, trespassers in the night? Everyone who cares about you has tried to talk to you into moving into town but you won’t listen. Common sense tells you a woman in your condition needs to be around other people.”

  Lenora took a step back, abruptly breaking the new aura of intimacy they had enjoyed only moments earlier. “If my story is to be believed? You suggest that I speak less than the truth?”

  “I don’t suggest anything. Sleeping with a rifle doesn’t make a woman safe. You need a man around here.”

  Lenora bristled. “Deputy Davies,” she said, “you made me believe that the notorious criminal you recently incarcerated, your malevolent scoundrel Sam Wright, was the main threat to my well-being. So why shouldn’t I send Mrs. Nolan to town for a few days? And besides,” she said, her chin tipped in defiance, “I am an independent woman. I do what I think is in the best interests of myself and my child and my ranch without consulting anyone. Now that the evidence is firmly established that my husband is deceased, there is no man on earth that I must seek permission from before I so much as wiggle a big toe.”

  Luke stared at her blazing eyes. “This independent man is going back to Buffalo,” he said, borrowing her argument. “Mrs. Nolan will be here with you by morning.”

  Lenora opened her mouth to protest, but Luke had already turned his back to her and with long, angry strides, headed for the barn.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Fully spent from an emotionally draini
ng day, Lenora slid into the oversized tin bathing tub, the warm water covering her softly protruding midsection. A bigger fire than usual hissed in the wood stove, a fire she had assembled to warm the kitchen for a long, Saturday night soak. There was enough oil in the hurricane lamp for one luxurious hour, though the bath water would likely be intolerably cool before the oil ran out, hence the extra wood in the stove. All she needed now was a fizzy bath bomb to scent the water, and tonight’s experience would be like the old days in New York. She made a mental note to order a box from Aeschelman’s next time she went to town.

  She relaxed in the warmth, hands resting fondly on her rounded belly, mulling Luke’s proposal. Who would have thought? In the space of a day—no, an hour—James’ death had been confirmed and another man had asked for her hand. Mrs. Nolan was right. A person’s circumstances could change drastically in a single day. Lenora’s had. But to her favor?

  It was too much too fast. Did she love him? She certainly was fond of him. Luke was strong, reliable, and attentive, and obviously he cared for her. And he was handsome, with broad, manly shoulders and honest eyes. But, Lenora sniffed, he was also one more man in her life who presumed the liberty of telling her what to do. It seemed that western men were as afflicted with the masculinity disease as eastern ones. Never mind her superior education, her good family, her ownership of a fine ranch that she hadn’t lost or even all the practical, ranchlike things she’d learned to do since she had moved to Wyoming Territory, like make jam and hold a rifle. To these obdurate men she would always be a delicate female in need of protection.

  Lenora glanced down at her swollen belly thoughtfully, hoping the reality of impending motherhood would inspire some poignant bubble of motherly wisdom to rise to the surface of her mind and guide her. But in the dim cast of the oil lamp and wavy refraction of the bath water, the hard round lump that impeded her movement more every day inspired only a bone-deep sense of fatigue.