* * *
Both of them overlooked their jealousy at the ice-skating party and fell into their familiar ways again. Buddy came to the ranch house in the evenings, and Nell found chores to do outside when Buddy was around. Sometimes, after Lucy and Mr. Archer retired for the night, Buddy sat next to Nell in front of the adobe fireplace in the kitchen and held her hand, or tucked her head under his chin and put his arm around her. He hadn’t said anything about the future, and Nell knew she couldn’t hurry him.
One day, Owen sent a note to the Rockin’ A, inviting Nell to go into town with him to see a play. She could stay all night with Alice at the Mackintosh house. Nell talked it over with Lucy. Buddy overheard and told her that sleeping at the Mackintosh house when Owen was there wasn’t proper. He said people would talk and she wasn’t to go, not if she cared about her reputation.
“You didn’t mind what people thought when you gave out my handkerchiefs,” she flared, but Buddy told her that was different. Nell didn’t see much difference.
“I won’t allow it,” he said.
“You won’t allow it,” Nell flared. She had been ironing, and she held the sad iron in the air as if it were a weapon. “You don’t have any right to tell me what to do.”
Buddy looked sheepish. “No, ma’am, I do not. I was only advising you.”
Nell thought it over and eventually told Owen no. She said she was needed at the ranch, but that wasn’t the reason. While she chafed at Buddy’s presumption, thinking he hadn’t the right to interfere, and she was disappointed that Buddy’s affection hadn’t gone beyond a few hugs and kisses, Nell turned down Owen’s invitation because she didn’t want to stay in the same house with Alice. She liked Buddy too much. In fact, Nell loved him. She hadn’t told Lucy—or Buddy, of course. She’d barely told herself. She’d never feel that way about Owen, and it would be wrong to lead him on. Besides, making Buddy jealous, she realized, only led to trouble.
“I’m glad you didn’t go to that play in town,” Buddy told her one afternoon in late winter when they had ridden out to check on a windmill that had stopped working.
Nell was silent. She didn’t tell Buddy that Owen had asked her out twice more and she’d turned him down.
“I never had a liking for him. He’s too high-hat for the rest of us,” Buddy continued.
And Alice isn’t? Nell wanted to reply, but kept the retort to herself.
“He flaps his mouth too much, just like that windmill—at least, when it’s working,” Buddy said, when they stopped at the watering tank and looked up at the blades. “I guess I’ll have Wendell to fix it.”
“Why can’t you do it?” Nell asked. She was surprised because Buddy seemed to be able to fix anything.
“I expect I could, but I’m not going up there.”
“Why not?”
Buddy turned red and looked away.
“I thought the cattle needed the water.”
“Yep. But the truth is I’m scared to death to climb up there.”
“You?” Nell had seen Buddy ride bucking broncos and go out in a blizzard to check the cattle. He’d stomped on a rattlesnake that had coiled itself around the clothesline pole, and he’d distracted an angry bull from Monty, who’d been bucked off his horse near the animal.
“I can’t get more than five feet off the ground without my hands sweat and I get all light in the head. It’s a failing I have, and it shames me.”
Nell thought that over. “I could do it. I could climb up there.”
“It’s too dangerous,” Buddy told her.
“I’ve climbed trees higher than that.”
“It wouldn’t be right, a lady like you climbing that windmill.”
Nell didn’t argue. Instead, before Buddy could stop her, she grabbed a coiled rope, put it over her shoulder, and began climbing the windmill. She didn’t stop until she was at the top. “I can see right here how it’s broken,” she said. “Send up those do-funnies you brought along. Put them in the bucket that’s over next to the tank.” She tied one end of the rope to the windmill and tossed the other end to the ground. “You send them up, and I’ll fix it.”
Buddy put the items into the bucket and tied the rope to the bucket handle, and Nell pulled it up. Within minutes she had completed the repair and was back down on the ground.
“Where’d you learn to fix windmills?” Buddy asked.
“My grandparents’ farm. Grandpa had rheumatism and couldn’t climb, so he sent me up when anything went wrong with the windmill.”
“Well, I never saw a lady that could do that before.”
“Oh, I can do plenty of things,” Nell said, basking in Buddy’s approval. Then she added, “And some of them aren’t so ladylike.”
“Well, I like a girl that can do for herself,” Buddy said.
Nell thought of Alice and preened a little.
“That’s the kind of girl I’d like to have on my ranch one day.”
Nell’s heart thumped as she glanced at Buddy, not sure what he was getting at.
“You think I could hire you as one of my hands?”
Oh, Nell thought. That was all. He was joking. “Not if I have to sleep in a bunkhouse.”
“I mean…” Buddy cleared his throat. “I mean sleep in my bed.”
Nell was so startled that she dropped the bucket. “What!” she said. There was anger in her voice.
Buddy turned red and shook his head. “I didn’t mean it like that.” He paused. “I didn’t plan to ask you until everything was ready. But I guess now’s as good a time as any, since I’ve just got myself into a nest of rattlesnakes here. That ranch I got my eye on, I’ll own it before the year’s out. It’s a fine place, good water and grass. A little cabin, too, and I plan to buy a real bed, no tick stuffed with straw. And a cookstove. It’s everything I ever wanted, but I don’t care to live there alone. A ranch can get awful lonesome if you’re by yourself.” He paused and looked down at his hands. “I think you like me, and Lord knows I like you, and … Oh, hell, Nell, will you marry me?”
For a moment, Nell was speechless. She had dreamed of this, but she was startled. She’d never thought Buddy would propose at a water tank. Finally she murmured, “You want me to marry you?”
“I think I just said that.”
“You mean this is a proposal of marriage.”
“I’d get down on one knee, but the ground is awful muddy.”
“I just—”
“You can say yes, or you can say no, but don’t tell me you got to think it over.”
Nell took a deep breath and looked into Buddy’s eyes, which at that moment were the exact color of the earth. “Of course I’ll marry you.”
Buddy took her in his arms and swung her around and around, until he slipped and they both fell into the mud. Nell landed on her back, Buddy on top of her, and they lay like that for a long time, Buddy pinning her down and kissing her.
CHAPTER EIGHT
One spring morning as Nell was clearing the dinner dishes, Buddy asked her to ride with him to the mountains to search for cattle that had wandered off. Wendell was laid up with a bad back, Monty and two other cowboys were in the north range, and Mr. Archer hadn’t yet replaced Charlie or Willy, who had gone to Albuquerque and married his Martha.
Nell wasn’t sure she should go. She had to help Lucy with three meals a day, seven days a week, and she’d already taken too many opportunities to be alone with Buddy. They had been engaged for a month, but they hadn’t told anyone. Nell hadn’t written her grandparents either. They would announce their engagement in the fall and marry in the new year, after Buddy had his ranch in order. That way they’d avoid the teasing and practical jokes as long as possible. Nell didn’t care about the teasing for herself, but she knew the cowboys would be merciless with Buddy, especially since most had been victims of his practical jokes.
Nell had just put her bread in the oven, and the yeasty smell filled the kitchen. If she waited for the loaves to be done, she could leave with Buddy, sh
e said. Lucy told her to go ahead, however; she’d take care of the bread. “You’ll be cowboying—and paid a lot less for it than the hands,” Lucy said. “Be sure and take a heavy coat and a bedroll. You never know when it’s going to snow.”
Nell scoffed at that. It was the prettiest kind of day, the sky sapphire blue without a single cloud. And as for a bedroll—the idea made Nell blush. If bad weather rolled in, she and Buddy would just head back to the ranch. Still, she followed Lucy’s advice.
Buddy had Bean saddled and ready to go when Nell emerged from the ranch house, a rolled-up blanket in her arms. She carried the coat, too, because the day was too warm to wear it. While she tied them to her saddle, Buddy stuffed a sack of food Nell had prepared into his saddlebags. It was their dinner and maybe supper, too, because they might not get home until late.
While she had lived on the ranch for six months, Nell had never gone into the mountains, and she was excited about the ride. The two of them loped past the poplars that shaded the ranch, across the plains, through the chaparral and the buffalo grass, dead and brown now. Sagebrush, its leaves glinting silver in the sunlight, scented the air. When she had arrived at the ranch, Nell thought the prairie was flat, but she’d learned it had gentle rises and was cut by arroyos where deer hid. Far off, she saw a herd of antelope, and as they rode along, she heard the sound of a meadowlark and saw hawks dip out of the sky in search of mice and rabbits. Once Buddy pointed out an eagle high above them. Buddy led her up a trail that was lined with piñons and scrub oak and chamisa. In the fall, the chamisa had turned yellow, giving the land a dusting of gold, but the flowers that remained were a dull gold now—just like the chamisa “corsage” Buddy had given her before Alice Mackintosh’s party. Nell had pressed it in her Bible.
“There’s a couple of mama cows that like to sneak off and come up here,” Buddy said. “We’ll find them and drive them down. Only hard thing is figuring out where they are.”
The trail was steep, with sharp drop-offs on one side. They didn’t bother Nell, but she wondered if Buddy was afraid of them. He’d admitted he was scared of heights. She didn’t ask, however. Instead, she looked out over the sweep of land. Clouds had gathered far to the north, and they sent blue shadows across the prairie, which was vast and brown and silent. She’d never seen a country so empty. From the high trail, she tried to spot the ranch house, but it was too far away. Above her were giant pine trees and patches of aspen. She remembered in the fall when the aspen had been swaths of gold against the dark mountains, but now the branches were bare and stood out like old gray bones.
Buddy dismounted and squatted on the trail, studying the dirt. “The cows have been along here, all right. See the tracks,” he said. “They hit out for the darndest places.” He mounted his horse and started off, the horse kicking loose a rock that clattered down the side of the mountain. Nell thought again how steep the trail was, and she was glad they were riding it in sunlight. Well, mostly sunlight, she thought, glancing up at the sky. There were a few more clouds, but they were still a long way off.
Buddy pulled off into a small valley, and they looked for the cattle. There were signs of cows, but they must have wandered away, maybe gone into some gully, Buddy said. He glanced up at the sky. “We should have checked the meadow first. It’s farther on. Most likely that’s where they are. We wasted time here.” They went back to the trail, and after a time, they came to a clearing where meadow grass was just greening. A stream ran through the open area, and on one side was a log cabin.
“Does somebody live here?” Nell asked.
“Not now. They did once. Maybe a trapper or a prospector, although there’s no gold hereabout. It might even have been an outlaw. Whoever it was is long gone. Cowboys use it sometimes. See that wood by the door?” He pointed to a woodpile near the cabin. “Out here, you’re welcome to stay at a place, but you got to replace what you take. Looks like somebody’s been here, all right, but I couldn’t say when.”
“An outlaw?” Nell shivered, either from the idea that a bad man might have been in the meadow or from the cold that was blowing in.
“Most of them are gone. But it could have been a rustler. We get them on the range sometimes.”
“Do you think Charlie was here?” She remembered that Charlie had threatened Buddy.
He shrugged. “Maybe. But he’s gone. I don’t see any sign of a horse.” While he talked, Buddy searched the meadow, and he held up his hand and nodded with his chin. “Over there, in the trees.”
“Charlie?” Nell wondered if Buddy had brought a gun.
Buddy laughed. “No, our cows.”
Nell narrowed her eyes until she saw them, dark shapes among dark trees under a darkening sky. She felt foolish about Charlie.
“They’re a wild bunch, and they won’t want to come. We’ll get behind them and holler so they’ll head for the trail. You ride to that side, and I’ll go to the other. When I yell, you wave your hat and yell, too. That’ll get them going.” Buddy was about to kick his horse into a run, but he paused. “You think you can do that? Those cows can stampede out of here if they get riled. If they scare you, I’ll do this by myself, honey.”
Nell smiled at the word “honey.” “I came up here to help. I’ll be all right,” Nell said. She was less afraid of the cattle than she was of doing something wrong and letting the cows run farther into the mountains. She’d be mortified if she caused the cattle to scatter and make more work for Buddy. “Wait till I put on my coat. It’s turned cold.” She dismounted to untie her coat, and as she did, she felt something cold and wet on her hand—snow. She looked up into the sky, wondering how the clouds had covered it so fast. There hadn’t been a single one when they left the ranch. Now they rolled across the sky with a fury, and the sky was turning black. Still, she wasn’t worried. It was spring. There wouldn’t be much snow, would there?
Buddy looked up, too. “I don’t like the looks of this,” he said.
“Oh, I bet it blows over,” Nell told him.
Buddy studied the sky, then looked at the snow that had begun accumulating on the ground. “Maybe we ought to forget the cows and go on back.”
“Oh, honey. It’s only a little snow.” She hoped Buddy was as pleased with the term of endearment as she had been.
He didn’t seem to catch it, however. “It’s a spring blizzard, Nell. We could get four, five feet before it stops. Maybe more. Anything happens to you, Lucy’ll snatch me bald-headed. The boys, too. Let’s go on back. We can get the cows another day.”
“Why don’t we round up the cattle first.”
“Let’s go. Get on your horse. We got to pound leather.”
Buddy had been so gentle with her, so sweet, after they became engaged. But now he spoke in a voice that made it clear he was not to be crossed. She didn’t like it, and she said, “I don’t understand why we can’t take the cattle.” She took her time untying her coat.
“I don’t want to ride that trail when I can’t see it. We could go over the side. Let’s quit here.” Buddy sounded almost angry.
“All right.” Nell’s coat was wadded up, and she flapped it to straighten it out before she put it on. The movement startled Bean, and he shied. And then suddenly he took off, heading into the swirling snow, toward the cattle. “Bean!” Nell called, but the horse disappeared. She turned to Buddy, and suddenly she was scared. “What do we do now?” She added, “I’m sorry, Buddy.”
“It’s all right,” he said, his voice soft again. “My horse could carry us both if it wasn’t for the snow. It’s not a good idea to ride double down that trail when we can’t see where the edge is. Fact is, it’s not a good idea to ride down that trail at all in this weather. I guess we’ll find out what that cabin looks like inside.” Buddy reached down and hauled Nell up behind him.
“What about Bean?” she asked over the sound of the wind, which was blowing hard now.
“There’s no way to catch him, but he’ll be all right. We’ll find him when the storm’s over. Or
maybe he’ll make his way back to the ranch. He’s a smart horse.”
Smarter than she was. Nell hoped Buddy didn’t think she was too stupid to be a ranch wife.
The snow was all around them now, and Nell didn’t know how Buddy could find the cabin. She thought it was the other way. She had lost her sense of direction. But then, she had never seen a storm come on that quickly. It hadn’t been five minutes since the snow started, and now it was so thick that she couldn’t see five feet in front of them. She held tight to Buddy’s waist. At least she had faith that he knew where he was going.
And he did. In a few minutes, they were at the cabin. Buddy tied his horse to a post near the door, then led Nell inside, walking about the cabin for a moment, his spurs trailing along the splintered board floor, as he checked for creatures that might have made their home there. He went back to unsaddle his horse and bring in his blanket and saddlebags. “Good thing we put the feed in mine,” he said, setting down the bags and removing his sheepskin gloves. Nell, shivering, kept hers on. She took out the lunch she’d packed and set it on the table.
“We better wait,” Buddy said. “We could be here a day or three.”
“Three days!” Nell said.
Buddy shrugged. “Maybe.” He looked around the cabin. “It’s not so bad. Roof’s tight. Somebody even set a fire.”
“Maybe he’s coming back.”
“Not from the looks of it. This fire’s been here awhile.”
Nell swiped at the dust on a broken chair. Judging from the dust and the spiderwebs, Nell thought whoever had been there last had indeed left a long time before. The magazine pictures pinned to the walls were water-stained and tattered, and the tin cans strewn across the floor, cans that had once held sardines and potted meat, were rusted. She found a rag of a shirt and dusted off the table and chairs. Then she used a broken broom to destroy the spiderwebs and sweep up the rodent droppings and the chinking that had fallen out of the log walls. When she opened the door to sweep out the refuse, the wind grabbed the sweepings from her and scattered them back into the cabin.
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