“I call that being right sensible,” said the man called Hank. “Now both of you unbuckle the belt guns and toss them. Real slow now, like molasses drippin’ in January.”
Buttons and Red did as they were told.
A breeze came up, bringing with it the mummy-dust smell of the warming desert.
“I hate to let you boys down,” Buttons said, “but we ain’t carrying money. All we got is a stiff in a box, a gent by the name of Morgan Ford.”
“That’s who we want,” Hank said. “Now untie the coffin and ease it down.”
Red said, “Hell, mister, what kind of road agent are you? There’s no profit in a dead man.”
“There’s profit in that one,” Hank said. “Now get him down from there.”
“Hank, lookee,” the towhead said, surprise spiking his voice.
Hank turned his head, following the other outlaw’s eyes. Red did the same and saw what the road agents saw. Leah Leighton was riding toward the stage, her horse at a walk. She’d tipped her hat to the back of her head, held by a string around her neck, and her hair was unbound, cascading in glossy waves over her shoulders. Her top shirt buttons were undone, revealing the generous swell of her breasts, and her lips were parted in a come-and-take-me smile.
Hank grinned. “Boys, looks like we’re gonna have us some fun today.”
“Better we shoot them two on the stage afore the hootenanny starts,” the towhead said.
“Yeah, sure Bob, after they get the coffin down,” Hank said. Then, his grin widening, “Save our energy for better things.”
“You two, untie that box and ease it down here,” the towhead said.
“Go to hell.” Red was poised, ready to jump from the stage and grab for his shotgun and die in one hell-firing moment of glory rather than get slaughtered like a sheep.
The third outlaw, who was yet to speak, raised his voice in sudden alarm. “No, Hank, leave her be!” he yelled. “She’s poison. She’s one of them Talbot ranch hellcats. I seen them hang a man for rustling one time, and they’re all poison!”
To everyone’s surprise, the good and the bad, the man swung his horse away from the stage and headed east at a dead run, trailing a ribbon of dust.
“What the hell?” Hank yelled, startled.
With less than fifty yards to cover, Leah Leighton’s paint quarter horse was suddenly coming on at the gallop. Colt in hand, the woman let out a high-pitched shriek, half war cry, half banshee wail, and cut loose . . . and at once men’s lives were measured in seconds.
Hank took a bullet while he was still trying to sort out what the hell was happening. Hit in the chest, he swayed in the saddle and attempted to bring his unhandy rifle to bear. Leah shot him again as she barreled past, then her eyes instantly shifted focus to the shocked towhead. The man recovered and triggered his Winchester, but he fired too hastily and too high. The bullet cracked air inches above Leah’s head. A split second later, the towhead’s eyes crossed as though he tried to see the chunk of .45 lead that had entered the bridge of his nose and shattered into his braincase. Bob Roper was a rapist and murderer, and his dying scream echoed all the way to the portals of hell.
When the first shot was fired, Red had jumped from the stage and dived for his shotgun. By the time he got to his feet, the gunplay was over and Leah Leighton was in hot pursuit of the outlaw who’d fled.
“Red, over here,” Buttons Muldoon called out. “This feller is breathing his last, but he’s still alive.”
Red joined the driver and looked down at Hank, who was coughing blood and dying hard, fright in his eyes.
“As a representative of the Abe Patterson and Son Stage and Express Company, I advise you that you’d best make peace with your God, mister,” Red said. “You took a bullet over a corpse in a coffin, and sure as hell that can’t make your dying any easier.”
The man struggled to speak, and then managed a smile, blood staining his teeth. “Lucky cuss,” he said. And then his labored breathing stopped, and his open eyes stared into eternity.
Buttons shook his head. “I reckon that’s the kind of luck a man can do without.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
The Patterson stage was fifteen miles north of the Rio Bravo, following the southwest course of the Arroyo Diablo, when Buttons drew Red’s attention to the dust cloud ahead of them.
“We’re getting close to the Talbot ranch,” Red said. “Could be cattle.”
Buttons nodded. “Yeah, it could be, but keep the Greener close.” He studied the land around him, a desert wilderness of rolling hills that supported wild oak mottes, scrub brush, cactus, and patches of prairie grass. “No sign of the Leighton gal, so we’re on our own.”
“I wonder if she caught that feller she was chasing.”
“I bet she did, and I reckon by this time he’s as dead as mutton in a stew,” Buttons said.
“She saved our lives. Thinking back on it, I could have gunned one of those road agents, maybe the two of them, but—”
“Red, we were both dead men from the git-go,” Buttons interrupted. “Sure, we could have rolled the dice and made a play, but them boys had us in their sights.” He looked up at the blue arch of the sky. “Yup, the gal saved our bacon and there’s no buts or maybes about the thing.”
“She could shoot, couldn’t she?”
“And ride like a Comanche.”
“Quite a woman, Red said.”
“I reckon it would take quite a man to tame her,” Buttons said.
Red smiled, shaking his head. “You’ll find no takers in this direction.”
“Too big a job for you, huh?”
“A dangerous job, I’d say. Would you like to argue with her about who dries the dishes?”
“Not me,” Buttons said. “I value my skin too much.” He looked ahead of him. “One, two, three . . . it looks to me like we’re about to meet another . . . I’d say five wildcats.”
“This has been a mighty strange trip.”
“And getting stranger. Like a sidesaddle on a sow.”
Ahead of the stage five riders had drawn rein, waiting. The women wore split riding skirts, boots, shirts, and wide-brimmed hats. Two carried sawn-off shotguns, the other three held Winchesters. All of them wore belt revolvers.
Buttons, ever the gallant cavalier, drove within five yards of the women, halted the team, and then stood in the box. He swept off his hat, bowed, then straightened. Smiling his most winning smile, he said, “I sure didn’t expect to meet so many lovely prairie roses in this neck of the woods. Did you, Mr. Ryan?”
Red shook his head. “No, I sure didn’t. As a representative of the Abe Patterson and Son Stage and Express Company, I can only say that in all my travels I’ve never seen the like.”
That was a small lie.
Three of the younger ladies were indeed pretty, but the faces of the two oldest showed the ravages of time and hard living. Red had seen features like that before, mostly on prairie women worn out from years of backbreaking work and childbearing. But these women had not been farmers’ wives. They looked like whores who had graduated from saloons and dance halls and ended up in hog ranches when they lost their looks. After the hog ranch, a fallen woman could fall no further. But someone had redeemed these women, cared for them, and given them a purpose in life. What that purpose might be, he had no idea . . . but he would find out soon enough.
The oldest woman, tall, thin with a lined face but no gray in her auburn hair, looked hard at Red. “So, you like what you see, huh, shotgun man?”
Red nodded and smiled, putting on his best bib and tucker. “Most assuredly, dear lady,” he said. “As my colleague says, prairie roses, each and every one of you.”
“Don’t get any ideas, big boy. When you arrive at the Talbot ranch, see you keep it in your pants,” the woman said. “And that also applies to you, Sailor.”
“Ma’am, I’m not a sailor, though I wear a sailor’s coat,” Buttons said. “My name is Patrick Muldoon. You can call me Buttons. Most folks d
o.”
“I’m not most folks,” the woman said. She carried a Winchester, held upright on her right thigh and carried a bone-handled Colt high on her waist, horseman style. “Follow us. We’ll reach the ranch in an hour, and supper will be ready.” Her eyes moved to the coffin. “Is the stiff in there?”
“As far as we know,” Buttons said. “We didn’t look real recent. In fact, we didn’t look at all.”
“Did you bring the right one?” the woman said. “His name is, or was—”
“Morgan Ford,” Red said.
“Huzzah for the shotgun man,” the woman said. “He ain’t as dumb as he looks.”
“Ford was Luna Talbot’s uncle.” Red said, taking no offense.
“Yeah, he was something like that,” the woman said. Then, after a pause, “My name is Corrine Walker. I’m one of Miss Talbot’s hands.”
“Right pleased to make your acquaintance, Miss Walker,” Buttons said. “Ain’t we, Red?”
“Overjoyed, I’d say.”
“Yeah, you look it,” Corrine said. “Now, sailor man, gee-up those nags and follow us.”
* * *
Corrine Walker rode point while the others split into pairs and flanked the stage. Red tried smiling at them, especially the pretty ones, but they didn’t smile back. In fact they ignored him, their whole attention fixed on the trail in front of and behind them.
“Right personable gals,” Buttons said.
“And that’s your idea of a good joke, right?”
“Yeah, it’s a joke, but I’m wondering about something that’s got me buffaloed,” Buttons said.
Red looked at him. “Let me hear it.”
“What the hell have we gotten ourselves into? That’s what I’ve been wondering on.”
“And it’s got you buffaloed, right?”
“Damn right.”
“Buttons, I don’t know what we’ve gotten into, but I got a feeling that it isn’t going to end well.”
Buttons turned his shocked face to Red. “You really feel that? I mean, deep down inside feel that?”
“I sure do. And it’s mighty troublesome.”
CHAPTER NINE
The Talbot ranch looked like any other in Texas at the time, a low, one-story ranch house showing three windows to the front and a porch hung with several earthenware ollas, a barn, corrals, blacksmith’s forge, bunkhouse, and a scattering of outbuildings. What made it different was that there was not a male face in sight. Even the cook who stepped out of the kitchen and threw away a basin of dishwater was a woman. She glared at the Patterson stage as it rolled past, but Red figured that cattle country cooks were an irascible breed, and he paid the woman no mind.
Buttons halted the team outside the ranch house, and within a few moments a crowd gathered, a dozen women dressed in range clothes with a few feminine touches like earrings and bracelets . . . and one of them was Leah Leighton, who spoke for the rest.
“Driver, stay where you’re at until you’re told to light and set,” she said. “That goes for you as well, shotgun man.”
“Real nice to see you again, ma’am.” Red was prepared to be sociable. “Last I saw, you were flapping your chaps for the Pecos.”
The woman’s smile was slight. “I didn’t need to ride that far. I’m a fair rifle shot.”
As was his habit, Buttons cut right to the chase. “Hey, lady, how come all I see is females? Are there no grown men on this ranch?”
“Now and again a man rides by, and if he behaves himself we feed him and send him on his way,” Leah said. “But only women work the Talbot.”
“How come?” Buttons said.
“Maybe you’ll find out, driving man. Maybe you won’t.” Leah turned and said, “Lucy, Alma and you, too, Eliza, get the coffin off the stage. Driver and shotgun man, you stay right where you’re at.”
“We’ll help,” Red said. “The box is heavy.”
“No, you won’t. The hands can manage it,” Leah said.
Buttons smiled. “Red, leave it to the cowgirls.”
Leah frowned. “Mister, we’re punchers, drovers, hands, waddies, or whatever the hell you want to call us, but what we’re not is cowgirls. Do I make myself clear?”
“Cow-women?” Buttons said. “Maybe so, huh?”
“Close, but no cigar,” Leah said. “While you’re here, to make yourself understood you can call us by our names.”
“That suits me . . . Leah.” Red said.
The segundo nodded. “Now I know why so many shotgun guards get plugged. Big mouths.” One of the younger woman giggled, and Leah snapped, “Alma, get that damned coffin down like I told you.”
“Where do you want it, boss?” Alma said.
“Take it into the toolshed for now. Mrs. Talbot will deal with it later.”
After the women, with considerable effort, manhandled the coffin from the stage and carried it to the shed, Leah told Buttons and Red to climb down. Both men were puzzled. A toolshed was a mighty unfriendly place to put a loved one.
“Miss Leah, I’d be obliged if I could feed my horses and let them rest for a spell,” Buttons said. “Then we’ll pick up our five hundred dollars and be on our way. The Patterson stage is always in the highest demand. Ol’ Abe Patterson said that, and he’s got it wrote down somewhere.”
“You won’t find passengers in this part of Texas, driving man,” Leah said. “We’re in the middle of a desert. Takes fifteen acres of range to support a single Hereford cow and a calf, and that’s why everybody you meet is passing through. Nobody travels to or from Hudspeth County. Well, nobody honest, that is.”
“And that’s why we’ll head north to El Paso,” Buttons said. “The town has a Texas and Pacific railroad station and a Patterson stage depot. Bound to be plenty of folks looking to travel from there.”
“Whatever you say,” Leah said. “All right. You can put your team in the barn. Oats and hay are scarce, so go easy on both. Once you got your horses settled, wash up at the bunkhouse and then come see Mrs. Talbot about your money.”
“I’d be right partial to some supper besides,” Buttons said. “I’m feeling mighty gant.”
“Luna Talbot won’t send a guest away hungry,” Leah said.
“We’re guests?” Red asked.
“Yes, of a sort,” Leah said. “At least, you’re not enemies.”
“And if we were, enemies?”
“You’d both be dead by now.”
* * *
West Texas was a pitiless, sunburned land that waged all-out war on women. But Luna Talbot was winning the battle. She looked to be in her mid-thirties, a tall, beautiful woman who transformed a riding skirt, plain white shirt, and boots into regalia worthy of a queen. She wore no jewelry except for the wide, hammered silver bracelet she wore on her left wrist and a plain gold wedding band.
Red and Buttons paused in their ablutions and watched her as she stood in front of the house talking to Leah Leighton. The segundo asked a question, listened intently to the answer, and then nodded and left in the direction of the toolshed.
Luna watched her go, then turned and walked with a purposeful stride to Buttons and Red. She smiled. “I had the roller towel replaced in your honor.” The woman stuck out a hand. “Luna Talbot. Welcome to my ranch.”
Red and Buttons each shook the woman’s hand, the first time either of them had clasped hands with a female, the dictate of Victorian etiquette then being that a man didn’t touch a woman’s body part unless he was married to her. Of course, in a brothel, that rule fell by the wayside. With that in mind, Red was at once suspicious about the real purpose of the Talbot ranch.
His misgivings were dispelled when Luna said, “A word of warning, gentlemen. No matter what they were in the past, my hands are ladies, and I expect them to be treated as such. No improper touching, please. No cursing, swearing, or suggestive language in their presence.” She smiled, withdrawing the sting. “Not that I would expect that kind of behavior from men who work for the Patterson stage line.”
“Madam,” Buttons said, puffing up a little, “you are so right. Representatives of the Abe Patterson and Son Stage and Express Company are always polite and considerate around women. It’s wrote down in the rule book.”
“I’m so glad to hear it,” Luna Talbot said. “Now, I’m sure Cook is putting supper on the table, and I believe we’re having braised steak, potatoes and gravy, with apple pie for dessert.” The woman’s smile was dazzling. “After dinner we’ll have coffee. I’ll pay you what I owe, and after that I’m hanging a man. You have no need to attend.”
CHAPTER TEN
The cook was surly, but the meal was excellent, though Red found he didn’t have much of an appetite. Luna Talbot’s almost casual mention of a hanging was weighing on him. As far as eating was concerned, Buttons took up the slack, but even he seemed several tones quieter than usual.
During supper, between silences, Luna talked about range conditions, how she’d sold the last of her longhorns and invested in Herefords, and how cattle prices had been disastrously low for the past three out of four years.
Never the soul of tact, Buttons stopped chewing long enough to mention the dead Morgan Ford and asked the woman when she planned to bury him. Then, smiling, “Or do you aim to keep him in the toolshed?”
“Soon,” Luna said. “I’ll lay poor Uncle Morgan to rest soon.” After a pause for thought, she added, “Did you first meet my segundo in Cottondale?”
Red answered. “Leah Leighton, you mean? No, not in Cottondale. We met her later.”
“Ah, yes, that would be when she saved you from road agents,” Luna said.
Red said, bristling. “We could’ve handled that scrape ourselves. We were ready to open the ball.”
Luna smiled. “Open the ball, huh? How interesting. . . that’s not what Leah says.”
Irritated, Red continued, “And talking about Leah, a man named Solomon Palmer got shot in Cottondale while we were there. He was posing as a preacher and told us he’d cared for Morgan when the man lay dying.”
“Yes, I paid him for that and for making the arrangements to transport Uncle Morgan’s body,” Luna said.
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