The Promise of Jenny Jones

by Maggie Osborne

  Ty's gaze settled on one of the children who had remained behind. She stared at the train with utter despair, her shoulders dropped,her small body trembling on the verge of collapse. Her hair was filthy and wild, and a thin shapeless rag covered her frame. What a waste, he thought. She was going to be a beauty one day. With those eyes…

  "What?" Abruptly, he sat up straight and his gaze sharpened. He knew those eyes as well as he knew his own. Hell, he ought to. He stared into those same blue-green eyes every morning in his shaving mirror.

  Before he could recover from the shock of finding his niece so easily and in such unexpected circumstances, a man pushed away from the side wall of the depot and stormed toward her. No, not a man. A woman dressed in male trousers and a lightweight poncho that swung open at the side slits to reveal a pistol strapped to her waist.

  Ty couldn't believe his eyes. She had done something to her hair, and now it was as black as roofing pitch. Stiff waxy tufts stuck out between her ears and her hat. Whoever the hell this woman was, she didn't possess a stitch of femalevanity, that was for damned certain.

  It was also certain that she was furious. Although he couldn't hear what she was shouting, she started waving her arms and screaming at his niece even before she reached the girl.

  Ty rose out of his seat, bending to the window while hastily gathering his belongings. With large hopeless eyes, his niece watched the raging advance of the now black-haired woman. As the woman rushed forward, her expression hardened and her arm rose as if she intended to beat Ty's niece into pulp.

  His shoulders tensed. If she struck his niece, by God he would kill her.

  When she was almost on top of his niece, the child stumbled forward and wrapped her arms around the now-black-haired woman's waist and sank into her. The woman stopped and the descent of her arm halted. Her expression flickered from fury to surprise to confusion to exasperation. Ty read her emotions as easily as reading words on a page. For a desperado, she was amazingly transparent.

  She waved both hands in the air as if she didn't know what to do with them, all the while looking down at the child. Then she rolled her eyes toward heaven, heaved a massive sigh, and dropped to her knees on the cobblestones. She gathered the child into her arms and awkwardly patted the child's back while the child clung to her and sobbed on her neck.

  She was a large woman, dressed as a man and wearing a sidearm. Ty didn't doubt that she knew how to use it. But right now, the child-stealer wore an expression of helpless confusion that would have done credit to the smallest, most feminine of creatures.

  Ty had no idea what had just happened here. Frowning, he watched the woman and the child holding each other and could not imagine why either of them was dressed the way she was or what their relationship might possibly be.

  A cloud of gray-white smoke belched past the window, obscuring his view, and a whistle screamed overhead. The boards lurched beneath his feet. Slinging his saddlebags over his shoulder, he strode down the aisle and out the door at the end of the car,then jumped to the ground. When he looked up, the now-black-haired woman and his niece had disappeared. They couldn't have gone far.

  Before he set off to follow, he shot a glance toward the departing train. Damned if his horse wasn't on its way toMexico City. How many horses had he lost now? Three? Cursing, he rapidly crossed the square and peered into the lengthening shadows creeping down narrow streets.

  He spotted them about a block ahead, the large woman and the small girl. The woman had a protective hand on the child's shoulder. His niece rested her head against the woman's side.

  Ty followed, keeping well behind them, pausing when they did. At the corner, the woman bent and lifted his niece, slinging the child over her shoulder like a sack of grain. She carried the girl another six blocks, to the entrance of a hotel that Ty would have overlooked entirely if the woman hadn't turned in at a door recessed from the street.

  When he was certain that she wasn't coming out again, he walked around the block, looking for the alley, pinning the location in his mind. A thick stench of roasting tobacco leaves burned his nostrils when he passed a factory on the north side of the hotel. To the west, a man wearing an apron hung lanterns in front of a cantina. In the street to the south, vendors packed away their wares for the night. When he had circled back to the hotel entrance, he stopped across the street and lit a cigar, frowning and considering his next move.

  Who the hell was she? He kept seeing her face in his mind. Tanned, strong features, a chiseled, stubborn jaw, blue eyes, one of them still bruised from the fight in Verde Flores. And that magnificent figure. The poncho she'd worn at the depot was no shield against his memory. A man didn't forget breasts like hers.

  He almost laughed aloud. After a lifetime of chasing soft, dainty creatures no larger than dolls, it amused him to realize that no woman had riveted his interest as did the tall strange-haired woman with the wicked punch who had stolen his niece.

  Shaking his head, he kicked at a horse-apple and waited for full darkness to settle.

  CHAPTER 6

  J enny sat by the window, hoping for a cool breeze while she watched Graciela wolf down a plate of food the manager had sent to their room. Between bites, the kid told of a harrowing day, about a man who had stroked her bare legs, about being chased by adults and street children, about falling and skinning her knee, about a wild dog that had terrified her and snapped at her bare feet.

  The horror of what might have been robbed Jenny of any appetite. Her own supper sat untouched beside the tub she had ordered up to the room.

  She wanted to shout and scream, wanted to beat the kid senseless. She wanted to point out that Graciela deserved the scares she had received and was damned lucky that nothing worse had happened. Through Graciela's bath, and throughout her recitation of the day's frightening events, anger and accusations burned on Jenny's tongue.

  "Kid," she said, when Graciela's torrent of words shuddered to a halt, "I've got a lot to say, but first … you did fine out there. You handled yourself a lot better than I ever expected you would."

  The praise came hard, but Jenny figured it would soften the kid for the harder discussion to follow. Besides, she conceded grudgingly, the kid deserved a word of praise. Jenny knew how hard it was on the streets. Earlier today, she wouldn't have given a centavo for the kid's chances to end her escapade relatively unscathed.

  "How'd you know to kick that bastard in the…"she paused and coughed into her hand. "How'd you know to bite and kick him?"

  Graciela pushed a long strand of wet hair away from her face and her chin came up. "I thought about what my mama would do." Her expression dared Jenny to scoff.

  "Huh." Jenny tried to imagine Marguarita kicking some son of a bitch in the cojones. Impossible. "Well," she said finally, "your mother was a brave woman." That much was true.

  Graciela's eyebrows lifted as if she hadn't expected Jenny's response. They studied each other. "How did you know I'd go to the train station?"

  "That wasn't difficult." Jenny shrugged. "I guessed that you'd remember me saying your stinking cousins might show up on theseven o'clock."

  The kid frowned. "I forgot you would be there too."

  "It's damned lucky for you that I was."

  "That's true," the kid admitted in a small voice. Sooty lashes came down on her cheeks as she closed her eyes and shivered. "I didn't want you to cut my hair."

  "I figured." Jenny pushed a hand through her own sticky, matted hair. She wondered how long it would take for the bootblack to wear off. "Look, kid,it's good you got scared out there, because we can't go through this again, you understand? You wrecked our plan. I didn't find us a new hotel because I thought you might come back here. Now the clerk knows I've altered my appearance."Which meant that she'd rubbed bootblack in her hair for fricking nothing.

  "Plus, you can't imagine what it was like when I didn't know where you were or what was happening to you." She looked out the window, up toward Marguarita's star. "I gave your mother my wo
rd. I promised that I'd take you to your father inCalifornia." She turned back to Graciela. "That's what I'm going to do, so you just make up your mind to it. The thing is,I need your help. You can't be fighting me every step of the way. That means we have to agree on a few rules. Such as, you don't run away again."

  Graciela picked at the edge of the towel wrapped around her freshly washed body. "Why can't you just take me home to Aunt Tete? You don't want to take me toCalifornia, and I don't want to go there. I want to go home."

  Lord, didn't she wish she could dump the kid on Dona Theodora's doorstep and ride away without a backward glance. "That isn't what your mother wanted. Look, kid, I gave her my word. I promised."

  Graciela gazed down at her lap, pulled her napkin through her fingers. "Mama won't know if you kept your promise…" she whispered.

  "I'll know!" Jenny glared. "When Jenny Jones gives her word, by God the thing is as good as done! This doesn't have anything to do with your mother anymore. Here's how it is, kid. After you give a promise, see, the person you gave it tois out of the deal. It's just you and the promise. If you keep the promise, then you're somebody. You did right. But if you fail, then you might as well stick a knife in your gut because you aren't worth spit. You're a person with no fricking honor. Now that's how it is. And that's why your butt is going toCalifornia."

  Graciela lowered her head and stared at her empty supper plate. A tear rolled down her cheek and plopped on the table.

  "Now, you wrecked our plan, you worried me half out of my mind, and something terrible could have happened to you. This tells me that we need some rules. I want your promise that you won't run away again."

  "I won't promise that," Graciela said in a low voice.

  "Kid, I'm not going to cut your hair. I changed my mind. Look over there on the bureau. I bought some hairpins. We'll pin your hair up under a boy's hat. I should have thought of this before. If you don't take off the hat, it should be all right."

  "Stop calling me kid! My name is Graciela. I hate it when you call me kid."

  Jenny's eyebrows lifted in surprise. She had to stop thinking that Graciela was a miniature Marguarita. Etiquette and convention were making inroads on the kid, but they hadn't yet quenched her fire.

  "All right," she said slowly, thinking over the request. "I can agree to that … if you'll agree to stop crying over every little damned thing."

  They measured each other, weighing their negotiating strengths.

  "I'll try," Graciela finally conceded. "But you don't think anything is worth crying over, and some things are."

  "Maybe," Jenny said doubtfully. "At your age anyway. You've got to agree to dress like a boy. And you've got to stop asking 'why' all the time because you're driving mecrazy."

  "I'll dress like a boy if you'll stop threatening to hit me. It scares me."

  Jenny considered. "Well, I can't agree to that," she said finally. "If ever I saw a kid who needs hitting, you're that kid."

  "Why?"

  "See? There you go with the why crap. Damn it!"

  "I want to know."

  "You need hitting because you're a superior, arrogant little snot and you think you're better than … other people." Color rose in Jenny's cheeks. "You don't do what you're told. You think you know everything when you don't know anything. You wish I was dead. You don't believe me or your mother about your greedy cousins. You have perfect manners and prissy ways. You don't know how to do anything useful, and your hankie is always clean. Of course I want to hit you."

  Graciela's lips pulled down at the corners. "Well, you walk like a man, and you don't say please or thank you. You got in a fight with my cousins." She shuddered. "You're always angry, and you don't say your prayers at night. You talk bad, and you smoke cigars when you think I'm asleep. You don't know my father, and you didn't even know my mama. You have hair between your legs, and the hair on your head is ugly. You aren't a lady."

  Jenny stood and looked out the window. The night was soft and hot; a million stars spangled the sky. She saw only one.

  "I guess we know where we stand," she said finally. "That's good. But I've had about as much negotiation as I can stand for one night, and judging from those yawns, I'm guessing you have, too. So get your butt in bed, and we'll talk more about rules tomorrow."

  "Why do I have to go to sleep before you do?"

  "Because I want to read my dictionary and get my thoughts settled down. And because I'm the adult, and you're nothing but a kid. Listen … you promised to stop asking why."

  "I didn't promise."

  Kids ran a person around in circles. Jenny didn't know why any woman willingly became a parent. Prior to this journey she had believed that skinning carcasses was the worst occupation in the world. Now she was convinced that raising children made skinning carcasses look like a plum job. When it occurred to her that she might have to spend the next ten or twelve years raising Graciela, despair nearly knocked her to her knees.

  "Put on your nightgown and get into bed." Scowling up at Marguarita's star, she waited until Graciela was ready to say her prayers, then she sighed and crossed the room to sit on the edge of the bed.

  "You should kneel," Graciela reprimanded her.

  "You're the one saying the prayers, not me. So say them and get it over with."

  "Atleast close your eyes."

  "All right! My eyes are closed. Say the damned prayers."

  "Our Father, who art in heaven…"

  Jenny heard a soft click and opened one eye,then she sprang to her feet in astonishment. The cowboy from Verde Flores stepped into their room, nudged the door shut,then aimed a Colt at Jenny's chest. Her mouth fell open in disbelief.

  "Unbuckle your gun belt. Slide it across the floor."

  Graciela screamed, then scrambled up on the bed and pressed herself to the wall. Her eyes widened in fear.

  "What the hell?" Jenny tried to sort it out. The cowboy? Here? Moving slowly in case he had an eager trigger finger, she lifted the hem of the poncho and reached beneath it to unbuckle her belt. "If this is a robbery…" But somehow she didn't think it was.

  "You have a lot of explaining to do. Now drop the gun belt and slide it over here, or I'll shoot. Don't think I won't. Until I hear your story, I'm assuming the worst. Give me the gun."

  The ice in his blue-green eyes told her that he meant it about shooting her. Reluctantly, she slid the gun and belt across the floor.

  "How did you find us?" Her mind couldn't make the leap from meeting him at the Verde Flores depot to seeing him here. But clearly meeting him again was no accident. Her gut told her that he'd followed them, but she couldn't think why he would.

  "I spotted you both out of the train window."

  "Why are you so interested in us?" Jenny demanded.

  But the cowboy was staring past her shoulder at Graciela. So that was it. "You filthy pervert!" Jenny's teeth pulled back in a snarl, and she lunged for him, catching him by surprise. Her head slammed into his belly like a battering ram, and the air ran out of him in a rush. When he doubled over, she brought her head up. The collision of head and forehead was harder on him than on her, and she knocked the Colt out of his hand.

  Before she could snatch up his gun or her own, he grabbed her and they fell to the floor, rolling, hitting, and punching each other.

  The fight was fair as fights went, and they were evenly matched. If Jenny hadn't jerked away to avoid a punch and banged her head hard on the side of the tub, she might have beaten him. But the head bang dazed her for a second, and that was all he needed to pin her.

  For two long minutes, he sat on her, holding her wrists to the floor and they both panted hard, sucking in air. A hot trickle leaked from Jenny's cracked lip; his bloody nose dripped on her poncho.

  "Jesus," he said, finally, staring down at her. "That's the first time I ever fought a woman." He stared at her bloody lip in disbelief. Then he stood and jerked Jenny off the floor. He slammed her down in a chair and pulled a length of thin rope from his belt.
r />   "Graciela! Run!" Damned if she would make it easy for him. She twisted and thrashed and tried to break free.

  He jerked her back hard and tied her wrists together. "Stay where you are, Graciela," he warned.

  It wasn't that the kid chose to obey the cowboy over her, Jenny understood that. The kid was terrified. She cowered against the wall watching with huge eyes, too frightened even to cry.

  The cowboy tied Jenny's ankles to the chair legs and looped a piece of rope around her chest and the back rails for good measure. Stepping backward to inspect his work, he wiped the blood from his nose, glaring down at her. He swore and shook his head.

  "Don't you touchher! " Jenny warned, speaking through her teeth. Her gaze was as frozen as his. "I swear to you. If you harm that child, I'll hunt you down if it takes the rest of my life, and you won't die fast, you piece of scum."

  "If I…?"His mouth twisted in revulsion. "I'm not going to … my God! My name is Ty Sanders. Robert Sanders is my brother. I'm Graciela's uncle, for Christ's sake."

  Jenny stared. Suddenly she saw the resemblance, the same blue-green eyes as Graciela's, the same wide mouth. Her mind raced backward, replaying Marguarita's story. Robert Sanders had not gone toMexicowith Marguarita; he had remained inCaliforniato ensure that his inheritance did not go to a younger brother. It struck her that the cowboy might be telling the truth.

  After checking again to make certain that Jenny was securely restrained, he walked to the bed and stood by the edge of the mattress. "So you're Robert's daughter."

  Jenny tried to read his expression, but she couldn't determine how he felt about his brother's daughter. The shortage of emotion suggested that he wasn't exactly overjoyed to meet his niece, and he didn't even know yet what a pain in the butt she was.

  "I'm your uncle Ty. Your daddy is my brother," he said in a voice distinctly lacking enthusiasm. "I guess your name is Graciela."

  "Don't talk to him!" Even if he was who he said he was,Jenny didn't trust his attitude.

  The cowboy considered her, then he walked over and stuffed Graciela's napkin into her mouth before he returned to the bed. "Your daddy sent me down here to find you and your mother and take you both back toCalifornia. He wants you to live with him."