Savage Land

by Janet Dailey

  Coley swallowed numbly. She should say something. He had obviously known that she had wondered why he hadn't come down yesterday to help her. Despite Tony's implication that Jase was a coward, Coley hadn't accepted that, but, before, she hadn't been able to come up with a logical explanation of why Jase didn't resuce her. Now she knew. He had fifty feet of reasons.

  'I know I cleared up one question, but what else is bothering you?’ Jase asked harshly. His blue eyes rested on her face, searching it relentlessly.

  'Nothing,’ she replied, none too positively.

  'Something happened when I was in San Antoine, didn't it?’ he went on.

  Coley plucked a blade of grass nervously and watched it twirl in her fingers. She could feel his determination and she hesitated telling him the reason for her quietness.

  'Coley.’ His voice was low and threatening.

  'Tony took me into town last Saturday,’ she said finally, glancing at him briefly out of the corner of her eye.

  'And?'

  'And—’ Coley paused. ‘And he told me how Rick died.’ She flinched as she saw Jason's dark head jerk back as if he'd been struck.

  'I see,’ he murmured as he leaned back on one elbow and stared at her with his diamond-sharp gaze.

  'I asked him,’ she asserted. An anger grew within her at his withdrawal. ‘I'm grown up. Things don't have to be hidden from me as if I were a child.'

  'If you were grown up, Coley, you wouldn't have to keep reminding people,’ Jase smiled cynically. ‘Now that you know, what good has it done you?'

  Coley shrugged.

  'I don't know,’ she said finally, ‘but I do know that you couldn't be a coward any more than you could be a murderer.'

  'Coley, for God's sake, grow up!’ Jase exclaimed angrily. ‘I'm not some knight in tarnished armour who needs a maiden to defend him!'

  'You're not trying to make me believe that you could have saved Rick and didn't, are you?’ Coley exclaimed. Painfully hurt by his anger, she jumped to her feet. ‘Because if you are, I'm not going to believe you! I know you're not like that!'

  He rose and stood silently behind her. ‘Coley.’ He watched as her slender shoulders shook with her silent sobs. His hands reached forward and drew her stiff back into his arms until his chin rested on her sun-streaked curls. ‘It's true that I want this ranch more than anything in this world.'

  With a heartrending sob, she wrenched herself free of his arms and ran to her horse. She was in the saddle and jerking the roan's head around when Jase caught hold of the bridle. She stared down at him, unashamed of the tears that were streaming down her cheeks.

  'I told you you'd only be hurt,’ Jase said quietly. His rugged features were set in a hard line and his eyes were bitter.

  'Jason Savage, if you really believed all those things you said about yourself, you wouldn't be here now,’ Coley said through clenched teeth. ‘And if you really want this ranch as much as you say you do, then you wouldn't care whose feet you'd have to kiss to get it nor what you'd have to do to prove you didn't let your brother die. But you haven't done either one. So I think you're just too proud. Too proud to go to your grandfather and tell him how you grieve for your brother and how you wish you could have got there sooner, and ... and...'

  She couldn't finish. She burst into tears and ended by jerking the roan out of his grasp. Viciously Coley put a heel to the horse's flank and raced down the hill, seeing nothing except the wall of water in front of her eyes.

  She was in the ranch-yard unsaddling her horse when Jase finally trotted his horse in. He reined in beside her and watched silently as she fumbled with the cinch in a desperate attempt to ignore him.

  'Well?’ she finally said in exasperation, staring at him boldly.

  'I was wondering if the thorns were still on my long-stemmed yellow rose.’ His eyes gleamed down at her, bright and questioning.

  'Yes, they are,’ Coley replied angrily, pulling the heavy western saddle off the roan and dropping it on the ground.

  'You can go ahead and ride alone from now on, as long as you stay within sight of the ranch and don't go near the pens.’ He didn't need to spell out which pens; Coley knew he meant the Brahmas.

  Only after he had turned his bay around and headed back out to the pastures did Coley stop to stare wistfully after him. At the dinner table that evening Jase and Ben began bickering about the advisability of moving a herd of stock cattle out of the south section. Jase felt they should wait and Ben said he wanted it done now. Of late, these dinner-table discussions had usually become quite heated as both were stubbornly against giving in to each other. Coley listened to the exchange quite indifferently until Jase happened to glance her way. He stopped almost in mid-sentence as he studied her smug ‘I-told-you-so’ expression before flashing her an amused and intimate smile. Coley tingled tinder its bewitching warmth.

  'Ben,’ Jase turned his smile to the gnarled, greyhaired man at the head of the table, ‘if you think I should move them, I will. Would you pass me some more of Maggie's bread?'

  His sudden acquiescence startled Ben, but it did not mollify him in the slightest. He turned his scowling face towards Coley, who quickly lowered her gaze to her plate so that he wouldn't see the bubbly brightness on her face. Instead she quickly started a nonsensical conversation with her brother over an imaginary difficulty in bridling her horse. The meal ended with Coley in giggles over some of the ludicrous suggestions proposed by Danny and Tony.

  Uncle Ben refused to join them on the porch, insisting that he had things to do in his study. Coley couldn't help thinking that he was doing a bit of childish sulking. Unconsciously she joined Jase on the cushioned porch swing and listened to Danny as he used his persuasive tactics on Tony to help him work on the transmission of his car. In the end Tony gave in, reluctantly, and followed Danny out into the yard, but not with the same amount of enthusiasm that Danny had. Coley leaned back on the swing and gazed at the crimson-kissed clouds of the sunset while listening to the well-modulated voice of Jase as he talked to Aunt Willy about her very favourite subject, her roses.

  'I was just mentioning to Colleen the other day that as soon as my tea roses bloom we should have a garden party,’ Aunt Willy chattered, only to be interrupted by the distant shrill of the telephone in the house. ‘My goodness, I wonder who that could be.'

  Coley watched with an amused smile as her aunt rose quickly from her chair, unceremoniously tugging at her creeping skirt before dashing into the house after the persistent ring.

  At the strike of a match from the man beside her, Coley turned her head to watch him light his familiar cheroot. A black eyebrow raised inquiringly at her. For a minute Coley studied him, admiring the strong, rugged angles of his face, the arrogant boldness of his nose, the soft yet cynical curl of his lips, the smooth, tanned forehead and the arching brows over his brilliant ice-blue eyes. The scar across his cheek seemed natural, a part of him, no longer frightening and ugly. Then the smoke from his cigar drifted between them, blurring her vision, and she turned again towards the sunset.

  'What pearl of wisdom are you thinking of now?’ he mocked lightly. ‘Or did you run out of them this afternoon?'

  'I was right, you know,’ Coley replied, tilting her button nose upwards ever so slightly at his words. ‘It takes two to make an argument. You proved that tonight at the table.'

  'It wasn't really an argument, more like a difference of opinion,’ Jase answered.

  'It was rather a loud difference, then,’ Coley said, accenting ‘loud’ with a trace of censure in her voice which earned her a quiet laugh from Jase.

  'And you feel I did the right thing, agreeing to his decision?’ he asked.

  'Yes, I do. It's time you two stopped lashing out at each other, trying to draw the first blood. He's an old man, Jase,’ Coley said earnestly. ‘And. he's crippled. He should be pitied and comforted, not quarrelled with.'

  'He's a Savage,’ retorted Jase angrily, ‘and no Savage needs pity.'

  'All rig
ht, compassion then,’ Coley inserted quickly, feeling a little flare of temper herself. ‘As much as you love this ranch, you should understand, of all people, how frustrating it must be to be confined to a wheelchair and not be able to get out and see what's going on. I believe you and your grandfather are equally devoted to this land.'

  'The Slash S is Savage Land,’ Jase declared, rising abruptly to his feet to lean against the porch railing and stare out over the darkening land. ‘And as long as there's a Savage alive, I'll never stand by and watch it go to anyone else. I'll do anything to stop it.'

  The passionate outburst brought Coley to her feet, moving her towards the straight back and broad shoulders at the rail. She stood silently beside him and laid a hand on the tanned arm that was gripping the wooden rail tensely. At her touch he turned and looked down at her.

  'Do you really believe that Ben doesn't feel the same way about this land?’ Coley asked. Her eyes were wide and anxious as she gazed up into his stern face.

  Slowly he turned and placed his hands lightly on her shoulders. A softness returned to him as he looked at her.

  'Coley, however right you may be,’ his voice was low and husky, ‘you can't wipe away the suspicion and distrust that has accumulated over a period of several years with a few words There are some wounds that take more than a kiss to make them better. They take time. So don't push us too fast.’ Very lightly he turned her around and gently pushed her towards the steps leading down on to the lawn. ‘Now, run along and find out what your brother and Tony are doing.'

  Reluctantly Coley stepped off the veranda, gazing back at Jase wistfully. He had lit another cigar and was watching the grey smoke as it drifted lazily in the night air. She turned her head and directed her unwilling feet away from the porch and Jase. She felt no elation or triumph, just a curious sense of suffering as if she had taken over part of his burden. But why was her heart beating so loudly and she was trembling too? Why?

  With an impatient hand, Coley wiped away the beads of perspiration that had gathered on her forehead in the hot Texas sun as she fed the last of an apple to her horse. The heat had sapped the enjoyment out of her late afternoon ride, ending it much sooner than was usual. Lethargically she patted the roan's head and moved away, her boots scuffing at the scorched ground as she walked.

  She sighed dejectedly as she glanced around the yard. She had thought Jase would he back by now. He had left the morning after their talk on the porch to move the cattle out of the south section. Everything seemed so purposeless without him around, and in this heat, there wasn't anything to do. Briefly Coley considered taking a short swim in the pool, but rejected it just as quickly. It would take more energy to change than she possessed right now. She didn't feel like going up to the house; she was too restless to sit around. So she just maintained her aimless, wandering pace.

  Her fingers trailed lazily on the top rail of the fence as she meandered around the corrals glancing disinterestedly at their occupants. In front of her were the reinforced fences marking the Brahma cattle enclosures. A little gleam of curiosity directed her footsteps towards the pens and the heavy plank boards that hid them from her view. She stood on tiptoe to try to peer over the slats, but the fence was too tall. Putting her feet on the bottom ratio Coley hoisted herself up to rest her elbows on the top board.

  The lone inhabitant was at the far end of the pen, but at the sound of Coley climbing on to the fence he had turned to face her. The heat waves shimmered eerily between them as the sun cast a ghostly grey sheen to his hide. The enormous size of the animal glued Coley to the fence, the grotesque hump on his shoulders and the loose, pendulous skin under his throat hypnotizing her into immobility. He took a step forward, then halted to stare at her. His large ears drooped along side his large head, accenting the menacing curve of his horns that curled above them like a demon's horns. But it was his eyes that held her, small and dark and not at all like the warm brown eyes she had always associated with cattle. No, these eyes were haughty and malevolent with their arrogantly sinister gleam. Coley felt the skin crawl up her back with her dawning comprehension.

  This was Satan! The bull that had killed Rick and scarred Jason! The colour drained from her face as she stared at the bull with a mounting fear. A nightmare-like feeling washed over her of a desire to flee while her legs remained fixed on the bottom rail. Her mouth was dry as she watched the Brahma lower his head and make one incisive furrow in the sun-scorched earth with his large front hoof. She was too frightened to call out or to move. With an ever-growing terror she watched the signalling hoof ripping the earth in mounting fury.

  Was this how Jase had felt? This terror that gripped the mind and body in a stranglehold that forbade them to move? Had he been able to swallow? Had Satan's evil hypnotism frozen him until the horror of Rick's screams broke the trance?

  Her fingers tightened their hold on the fence, her knuckles growing white with the fierceness of their grip. Coley's breath came in short, panting sobs as her eyes watched with rounded horror the beginning movements of the bull's charge.

  In the next instant she was ripped from the fence, the piercing scream of agonizing fear at last torn from her throat. Roughly her head was pushed against a solid chest where her voice was muffled by a dusty cotton shirt. The familiar scent of cigar smoke clinging to the fabric broke the hysterical cries. The rigid terror that had held her captive was gone and Coley collapsed in Jason's arms. She was safe. He had rescued her and the sobs of relief were welcomed.

  The circle of his arms nearly crushed her as he held her ever tighter to him, but Coley didn't care. His own face was pressed against the top of her head and though he was speaking it was too muffled to understand. And then she was being slowly disentangled from his arms as Jase held her away from him. Her long fingers remained resting on his chest as she looked up into his face. It was as drained of colour as hers had been and there was no mask to hide the slowly receding anxiety in his eyes.

  'I was so frightened I couldn't move,’ Coley whispered as she leaned slightly towards him with a desire to return to the shelter of his arms.

  'You should have been,’ Jase replied huskily, giving her shoulders a sharp shake. ‘You were told to stay away from here.'

  Coley looked into his face now, her lips forming the words of explanation, but the icy cold anger in his eyes smothered the words. He had withdrawn from her, back behind his mask.

  'Jase, please, don't shut me out,’ she pleaded softly, blinking quickly to hold back the tears.

  It was as if he hadn't even heard her speak. ‘I don't want to ever find you anywhere near these pens again,’ he said coldly, releasing her shoulders to stand towering above her. ‘There's an invisible line that runs from the house to the stables and I don't want to ever find you off that path. If I do, you can consider anything outside of the house yard off limits. Do you understand?'

  'Yes,’ Coley answered weakly. Her round eyes glanced away from the ice-blue hardness of his gaze. Just for a moment she thought he softened towards her and she added, ‘I'm glad you're back.'

  'Go up to the house,’ Jase ordered sharply, and her shoulders sagged under the harshness of his tone.

  Slowly she turned and took a few steps in the direction of the house. She hesitated and then looked over her shoulder, trembling under the censure in his cold, rigid expression.

  'That was Satan, wasn't it?’ she said quietly. The almost imperceptible distension of his nostrils answered her, although Jase didn't utter a word. He just eyed her coldly and turned away towards the pens.

  It was a long walk to the house and though the distance shortened with each step, Coley felt each step she took was widening the distance between her and Jase. She spent a miserable evening in the house despite Danny and Tony's attempts to cheer her up. Later Danny came to her room, but she couldn't bring herself to confide in him. Somehow the simple incident seemed so complicated that she didn't know how to explain it to him without him scoffing at her overactive imagination, so she
said nothing.

  The next three days were equally miserable as Coley made the picket fence around the house her prison walls. She had no wish to incur Jason's wrath following that imaginary line to the stables. She tried to busy herself helping Aunt Willy in her rose garden and when that failed she would exhaust herself in the pool. But after sitting through the evening meal while Jase repeatedly ignored her and for the fourth time in a row excused himself from the table as soon as everyone was through to go heaven knew where, Coley felt she had reached the end of her tether. A restless despair consumed her as she sat on the porch with her Aunt Willy and Uncle Ben. From deep within the hills came the echoing rumbles of a distant storm, with faraway flashes of lightning.

  'Looks like we'll have a summer storm on us before morning,’ Aunt Willy said. ‘I certainly hope it won't be too severe. The last one played havoc with my rose blooms. You seem very upset tonight, Colleen dear. Is anything wrong?'

  'No, Aunt Willy,’ she answered quickly. ‘I was just thinking maybe I'd go up to my room, take a quiet bath and get an early night. My nerves are a little on edge—from the storm, I suppose.'

  Gratefully for Coley, her aunt accepted the explanation and she sped up the steps and into her room before any more questions were asked that she couldn't answer. The bath did little to soothe her. In fact the stifling stillness of the coming storm made Coley wish she had showered instead of soaking in a tub of scented bubbles and hot water. Pulling the covers to the foot of her bed, she laid her robe on a chair before leaning back on the sticky sheets to stare at the ceiling.

  A blinding flash of light followed immediately by an explosion of thunder wakened Coley from her fitful sleep. Her heart was beating at a frantic pace as she sat up in the bed and waited in fear for the last echo of the thunder to roll away. Another bolt of lightning flashed outside her window and she quickly covered her ears with her hands and squinched her eyes shut until the next roll of thunder passed. In the brief lull that followed she hopped from her bed, grabbing her robe as she went by the chair and out of her bedroom door. The darkness of the hallway stopped her as she fumbled for the light switch. Then her fingers stopped their search; she didn't want to waken the others. She groped in the darkness for the stair banister while the intermittent lightning eerily illuminated the interior of the darkened house.