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Not a one of the men he’d fired had stolen from him. Other trail bosses sometimes discovered men had taken off with a horse from the outfit’s remuda after being fired. He didn’t. He laid down the law on exactly how a thief would be dealt with from the day he hired a man, as well as plenty of other expectations. He lived by the rules he set as strongly as he laid them out.
Despite what some liar in New York had said all those years ago, he’d been honest his entire life, and expected as much from others.
There were fifteen men in his outfit, not counting himself, JoJo—the best trail cook God ever gave a frying pan to—and Bat, JoJo’s helper. While riding alongside the herd, even as his thoughts roamed, Garth counted heads. Human ones. He hadn’t lost a single hand on this trip, and was more than relieved about that. He was pleased, too, and would be the first to admit it took a lot to please him.
Satisfied with the number of men he’d counted and confident the cattle were moving at a solid pace, Garth forced himself to put the calf out of his mind and rode past the point riders to catch up with JoJo.
The chuck wagon always traveled a few miles ahead of the herd, and as Garth rode, the calf crossed his mind again. Even if he found a sodbuster to take it, the calf wouldn’t have much of a chance. Orphans as a whole didn’t stand much of a chance. He was reminded of that every time he traveled north into Kansas.
If the orphanage hadn’t taught him that, the farmer who’d taken him off the train had. He’d spent over a month with Orson Reins before deciding he’d had enough. Orson had said from the moment Garth had arrived at his farm that you could take a boy off the street, but the only way to take the street out of the boy was with a whip. When Orson had broken out his whip again, something had snapped inside Garth and he’d wrestled the whip out of Orson’s hands and left.
He’d carried that whip with him for five years, until one night when he’d burned it, concluding his past was well and gone. He was never going back, so there was no need to hold on to any reminders of his past.
“Heading out, Boss?” JoJo shouted above the rattling of his chuck wagon.
Garth caught up with the wagon, and then reined in his horse next to where JoJo sat on the wagon seat. “I remember some water being a short distance ahead.”
“Still figure we’re about five days out?” JoJo asked.
“Four if we’re lucky.”
“You’re lucky all right,” JoJo answered with a laugh. “This trail is working out for us. You know I had my reservations.”
“You liked the Chisholm,” Garth answered. On his way south last year, he’d veered west to explore the Great Western Trail. Some swore by it, others claimed it was cursed. The same was true for the Chisholm.
“Was used to the Chisholm,” JoJo said. “Knew every hill and water hole on that trail. So did you.”
“We did,” Garth admitted. He’d chosen the Great Western this year because these were his cattle being driven north. After spending all winter acquiring and paying room and board for the whole lot of four-footed beasts, he needed to get top dollar.
“But Dodge is paying more than Wichita right now, so we took this one,” JoJo supplied, rubbing his scruffy gray beard with one hand.
Garth nodded. “You’re smarter than you look. Guess you do have a brain under that bald scalp.” Though Wichita was still accepting cattle, the days of the big drives were limited. The farmers were putting up too much of a fuss and the townspeople were agreeing with them, laying down more and more rules for the cattlemen to follow.
JoJo pointed a finger. “And your mug is uglier than you think.”
Garth laughed. “I never claimed to be handsome, but can’t say I’ve had any complaints, either.”
JoJo chortled, and rubbed his beard a bit more when he asked, “What you gonna do with all that money you’re gonna make on this trip? Got yourself a woman holed up somewhere?”
Garth laughed. A woman was the last thing he wanted. “If I did, I sure wouldn’t tell you about it. You’d try stealing her.”
JoJo laughed so hard he coughed. With watery eyes, he said, “Not me, but Bat might.”
“Uh-uh,” Bat said, shaking his head. “I don’t want no woman telling me what to do.”
Bat was the youngest on the drive. Too young really, maybe ten or twelve, but JoJo wouldn’t leave Texas without the kid he’d found somewhere over the winter. Knowing the options for an orphan too well, Garth had agreed the boy could join them. He wasn’t sorry, either. Bat was a good little worker and certainly earned his wage.
The boy was an added bonus, to Garth’s way of thinking. Bat was the reason JoJo had been willing to leave the outfit he’d been with for the past several years. JoJo never said Evans wouldn’t let a kid join his drive, hadn’t needed to. Bottom line was Evans’s loss had been Garth’s gain. An outfit needed a good cook, and JoJo was one of the best. Even though he was a bit cantankerous at times, and full of himself.
“Now that’s smart thinking if I ever heard it,” Garth said to Bat.
The boy grinned and sat a bit taller on the wagon seat.
“Malcolm sure was sad to see you leave,” JoJo said.
Malcolm Johansson, the man who’d hired him when he’d been as green as grass, was still a trusted friend and a man Garth was thankful to have met. Malcolm was a hard man, but an honest one, and had taught Garth a lot about life. “I told him my plan the day he hired me.” A plan he was still working on. That’s how he did things, thought each detail out thoroughly before putting them in place, and then followed them through to the end. That had been the one lesson he’d learned back at the orphanage that he’d held on to. Not thinking things through made for a tough life.
“I heard as much,” JoJo said. “But Malcolm was still sad to see you leave his employ.”
“Sam Taylor will serve Malcolm well,” Garth told JoJo the same thing he’d told many others when they’d questioned him leaving Johansson’s employ. “He’s been driving cows to Wichita for years.”
“Yeah, he will,” JoJo said. “But Sam Taylor ain’t no Garth McCain.”
Coming from JoJo, that was a compliment like no other, and Garth figured it was a good place to end the conversation. “I’ll be back in time for the evening meal,” he said, tapping his heels against his horse.
“Don’t forget my supplies!” JoJo shouted.
Garth waved a hand to signal that he’d heard while urging the horse into a gallop.
They had to be around forty miles south of Dodge City. He could almost smell the town. Every stinking inch of it. Dodge smelled of cattle, booze, cigar smoke and women. Not a single one of those things was offensive to him.
This would be the first time he’d dealt with the stockyards there. All his other drives had ended in Wichita. That’s where he’d made his way to after leaving Orson’s place, and where he’d run into Malcolm. At the Wichita stockyards. The man had told him if he ever made it down to Texas to look him up. He was always in need of cowboys.
That was exactly what Garth had done, followed Malcolm all the way south, and along the way, told Malcolm his plan. That he’d work for him, until it was time for him to go out on his own. That had been nine years ago, and last fall, after returning to Texas, he’d told Malcolm it was time. It had taken him years to save up enough money to assure all would turn out just as he’d imagined. A good sale this year would guarantee he’d been right.
Malcolm hadn’t tried to talk him out of going out on his own. Instead he’d offered a place to pasture the cattle Garth had bought and rounded up throughout the winter—at a price of course. Garth hadn’t expected any less.
That’s how life should be. Fair. Honest. That had been an issue for him. People’s dishonesty. Malcolm claimed Garth had driven away more cowhands than any man he’d ever known. Garth had retorted by saying Malcolm should be happy about that. No one wants a dishonest man in their employ. Or foolish or impulsive ones. That’s how mistakes were made.
Malcolm had agreed, but had also warned him to be careful about expectations. Said sometimes a man doesn’t know what he wants until he sees it.
Garth laughed at the memory. He knew what he wanted. Right now, that was water, so he settled his attention on the lay of the land, looking for telltale signs. In this country, that meant trees.
Glancing in both directions, and straight ahead again, Garth drew a deep breath and let it out. He’d settle for one. One tree. That’s all he needed. Just one.
Once he found a water spot for the cattle to rest for the night, he’d ride on into Hosford and pick up some coffee and bacon. JoJo had said this morning there wasn’t quite enough to get them to Dodge. The cook had offered to ration the portions if needed, but Garth had said no. His men earned their wages every day, and their fodder. He’d never told a cowhand he couldn’t eat his fill, and he wasn’t about to start now.
The other reason he needed to go to Hosford was to send a telegram to Dodge, to make sure the stockyard was ready to receive his cattle.
He held up a hand to shield the glare of the sun as he scanned the horizon. One of the downfalls of being the first drive of the year was not having a clear path to follow. The trail had been well-worn last fall when he’d taken it south. Now a new growth of grass covered the prairie. What he’d followed last fall could be a few miles either east or west. He didn’t think so, but had to admit it was possible. Cattle needed grass to eat along the way, which meant drives didn’t follow an exact trail. Rather, the route was spread out east and west for miles. Hence, why some called the Great Western trail cursed. Water, the other thing cattle needed, could be elusive. Might be only a mile away, yet never found.
The same was true for the Chisholm, and he’d been the first on that trail more than once over the years. Trusting his gut, he angled his horse slightly northwest. This land was so flat, so barren, a tree should stand out like a red petticoat, but dang if he could see one right now.
He clearly remembered a creek crossing the trail around these parts. An offshoot of the larger river farther east. He’d camped near that creek. Alone last fall, he’d traveled much faster than he could with a drive of over twenty-five hundred head of cattle, but considering they’d stayed near the Big Basin two nights ago, that creek had to be close. Hosford couldn’t be more than five or six miles north of here.
Scanning the area again, he pinpointed his gaze. A dot on the horizon could be a tree, or it could be a house. There was only one way to find out.
Chapter Three
“These green beans are so delicious, Bridgette,” Emma Sue said with a voice that was little more than a whisper. “How did you make them?”
“I fried them in the bacon grease left from this morning,” Bridgette answered while gently covering the dough she’d just rolled out and cut into strips. Squaring the corners of the cloth to make sure dust or insects didn’t settle upon her egg noodles as they dried, she continued, “I also added a few onions I found growing west of the house.”
“I think that’s where the former owners had their garden,” Emma Sue said. “Cecil didn’t want it that far away from the house. Said it was too far for me to carry water.”
Bridgette chomped her teeth together to keep from making a comment about Cecil carrying the water and pretended to be focused on securing the edges of the cloth with a couple of spoons.
“I’m sure Cecil will like green beans prepared like this. He claims he doesn’t like them, but he must, because he never brings home any other seeds.” Smiling, Emma Sue chewed another small forkful of beans before speaking again. “I got some carrot and turnip seeds, and a few others from my father, but I’m afraid Cecil forgot to water them when I first took ill.”
“He didn’t forget,” Bridgette mumbled as she crossed the room to add salt to the pot of water holding the rabbit she’d shot after tending to the garden this morning. Cecil may be too lazy to see Emma Sue got the proper nourishment, but she wasn’t.
“What? I’m afraid I didn’t hear you.”
Bridgette covered the pot and pulled up a smile before she turned about. “Nothing, just talking to myself.”
“Cecil’s not always this grumpy,” Emma Sue said. “He’s just frustrated because...” Her cheeks turned pink as she laid a hand on her protruding stomach. “Because with me so far along we can’t...”
Bridgette held up a hand, hoping to stop Emma Sue before she finished her sentence, but it was too late.
“Well, you know, be husband and wife.”
Bridgette stifled a groan. She’d known what Emma Sue had been referring to, and hadn’t needed to hear it. If she let that image into her head, she might never be able to sleep again.
Moving and using her hand to gesture toward the table, Bridgette said, “There’s more bread and the beans are on the stove for when Cecil returns. I set the rabbit to simmer while I’m gone, and there’s nothing you need to do with it or the noodles.” She’d hoped to have left long before now—sincerely wished she had—but Emma Sue hadn’t wanted lunch prepared until Cecil arrived home. Not willing to wait any longer, Bridgette had overridden that notion, explaining there were other tasks that needed to be completed yet today.
“Will you teach me how you made those noodles?” Emma Sue asked, gesturing toward the cloth. “Cecil really enjoyed them when you made them last week with the pheasant he shot.”
Bridgette had to bite her tongue to keep from pointing out that she’d shot the pheasant—another skill she’d been taught while being a nursemaid to yet another family. Once the urge passed, she said, “You just beat a couple eggs with enough flour to make a sticky dough and then fold in enough flour until you can roll it thin and slice it into strips.” Pulling the apron over her head, she crossed the room to hang it on its nail. “I’ll be back as soon as possible, and add the noodles to the pot then, so don’t worry about that. They’ll only need to cook a few minutes and supper will be ready.”
“I don’t know what I would have done without you these past few weeks.” Emma Sue sighed. “Walking all the way to Hosford and back to sell the eggs would have been too much for me.”
“Yes, it would have been,” Bridgette agreed. Suggesting Cecil could easily make the trip, considering the money they made from selling eggs was about their only income, crossed her mind, but there was no need in pointing out the obvious. “You’ll rest while I’m gone?” she asked Emma Sue pointedly.
“Yes. I might sew, but I’ll do that in my bed.”
“Good, that’s what I needed to hear.” Bridgette took down her bonnet from the nail in the corner where her personal belongings were folded and stacked, including the blankets she spread out on the floor to sleep upon each night. Twisting the bonnet ties into a bow beneath her chin, she said, “I already have the rabbit fur soaking. Once I’ve tanned it, you’ll be able to make something for the baby. Maybe a warm hat for this winter.”
“Oh, that is so nice of you.” Emma Sue shook her head. “You are so smart. How did you learn about so many things?”
“I’ve been a nursemaid for many families over the years,” Bridgette answered. “And have learned something from each one of them. Opal Andrest showed me how to make the egg noodles and Ted Wilkenson taught me how to tan a rabbit hide.”
“Oh, what are you learning from us?”
How I don’t want to live. Not able to say that, she smiled. “I’m not sure yet, but I’ll tell you as soon as I do.” Since that didn’t sound very flattering, she added, “Someday we’ll have time for you to teach me some of your embroidery stitches. You are very good at that.”
Emma Sue beamed. “Oh, yes, I will teach you.” Her smile faded. “But I’ll need to get some more thread and—”
“Don’t worry about that now,” Bridgette said. “We have time.” Picking up the two baskets of eggs, she added, “But I don’t. I must hurry. Don’t want Mr. Haskell closing his store before I get these eggs delivered.”
“Please remember Cecil’s plug of tobacco.”
Bridgette nodded and walked out the open doorway. If she kept biting it, she wouldn’t have a tongue left by the time Emma Sue delivered that baby. Leaving the door open for some air circulation, she started down the pathway that would eventually lead her to the road to Hosford.
She couldn’t seem to walk fast enough. It was as if she was escaping, running away. That wouldn’t happen. She was only taking the eggs to town to sell them. However, that in itself was an escape. A welcome one. Even though it wouldn’t be more than a couple of hours. She couldn’t be gone any longer than that. Emma Sue’s time was near.
A shiver rippled Bridgette’s spine. “No,” she said aloud, forcing her mind not to bring up any images. Not to remember Emma Sue’s statement. She knew what husbands and wives did to produce babies. She’d helped with numerous deliveries and had performed several alone when Dr. Rodgers hadn’t arrived in time.
Every birth made her think of her own life. Her future. Babies of her own. It felt as if she’d been waiting forever for that to happen. Waiting to start living the life she dreamed about each night. Waiting for her husband.
She sighed at that thought. Garth wasn’t really her husband. It hadn’t been a real marriage. She’d been seven and just learned the truth about her parents, that they’d died and would never be coming back to get her from the orphanage. She’d told Garth she didn’t want to be an orphan and he’d said he’d be her family, then neither of them would be orphans. When she’d said two people couldn’t just become family, he’d said they could if they got married. So he’d married her. It had been a pretend ceremony, in the backyard of the orphanage under the same big tree she’d fallen out of—and broken her arm in the process. But she’d never felt like an orphan, never felt alone, after that make-believe ceremony.
An outsider yes. That she’d been since being taken off the train. Living with people who would never be her family.
“Hold up there!”
Frustration shattered her thoughts. Letting out a long sigh, she turned about and watched Cecil riding his big plow horse along his barbed wire fence. She squinted as he rode closer, trying to figure out what he had on his lap.
Curiosity won out, and she made her way toward the hole he’d made in the fence. A gate would have been too much work for Cecil. “What do you have?” she asked.
“You told me to get a cow,” Cecil shouted. “I did better than that! Got a calf!”
Sure enough, it was a calf. She recognized that now that he’d pointed it out. “How on earth do you expect to keep a calf alive?”
He rode past her, toward the barn that was in serious need of repair. “I ain’t gonna keep it alive. We’s gonna eat it.”
Momentarily stunned, Bridgette shook her head, questioning her hearing. It only took a moment for her to realize she’d heard right. This was Cecil, and that’s just how he’d think. “Oh, no, you’re not!” she shouted, running after him. She’d carefully packed straw around the six dozen eggs in the baskets to prevent breakage, but at this moment, she didn’t care if every egg broke.
When the horse stopped near the barn door hanging on one hinge, she set down both baskets and marched forward. “A calf’s not better. Emma Sue needs milk, cream and butter. That you would have gotten from the calf’s mother. Whom that calf needs. Where is she? Where’s this calf’s mother?”
“Back with the rest of the herd,” Cecil said. “And I am too gonna kill this here calf. That’s what that cowboy was gonna do.”
“What cowboy?” she asked, rubbing the calf’s nose. It was adorable. Red-brown with the cutest little white face and big brown eyes. The poor thing couldn’t be more than a few hours old.
“One of the cowboys with the cattle drive,” Cecil said. “The trail boss told him to shoot the calf. Lucky for me I rode up when I did.” Curling one edge of his upper lip, he chortled. “He didn’t want to shoot it. Tried, but didn’t have the guts to pull the trigger. I watched him.”
Infuriated, Bridgette slapped his leg. “Get down.”
“Let me hand you the calf.”
“No,” she snapped. “Leave the calf where it is. Just get off that horse.”
“I cain’t get off with it on my lap.”
She grabbed a handful of his pant leg and pulled. “Yes, you can. Now get down. Hurry up.”
“Why?”
Holding back a scream that tore at her neck muscles, she growled, “You either get off that horse, or I’ll leave. I’ll go to Hosford and you’ll be out here alone, taking care of Emma Sue, and the baby that’ll be born any day now.”
“You cain’t do that.”
“Oh, yes, I can.” As a second thought, she added, “And I’ll tell Emma Sue’s father you wouldn’t listen to me. That I couldn’t tolerate being in your presence any longer.”
He scooted back in the saddle and swung a leg over the horse’s rump. “You don’t gotta get snippy about it. I thought you’d be happy. I did what you said.”
As soon as he was out of the way, she gathered her skirt with one hand and stuck a foot in the stirrup. “No you didn’t,” she said once she’d swung into the saddle. “I told you to get a cow.”
“Well, whaddya call that?” Cecil frowned. “Where you going?”
Once she had her skirt positioned so she could sit comfortably, she scooted forward, easing the calf onto her lap. “To get its mother.”
“They won’t give you its mother,” Cecil said. “They wanted it dead so they could take the mother to Dodge.”
What she’d told Emma Sue had been the truth. She’d learned a lot from the other families she’d been farmed out to as a nursemaid. The things she’d learned came in useful every day. Including today. “Give me those egg baskets.”
“What for?”
Huffing out a sigh at his ignorance, she explained, “Because I’m going to trade them to the cattle drive cook for the calf’s mother.”
“Eggs for a cow.” He guffawed. “You’re addlebrained.”
“No, I’m not.” Unable to hold it back, she said, “You are. Eggs are a luxury to the men on a cattle drive.” More than once she’d seen people trade eggs and vegetables for beef when the drives came through. “Go in the house and get me that bucket of beans, and my apron.”
“What ya need the calf for if’n your trading the eggs for its momma?”
She closed her eyes in order to gather her temper. “Because there will be hundreds of cows out there. I’ll need the baby so the mother will sniff it out, and that will tell me which cow is its mother.”
Cecil frowned. “Well, what—”
“Just go get the beans and my apron, and hurry up! This calf isn’t going to live long hanging over this saddle.”
He spun around. Bridgette knew it wasn’t because of her. Emma Sue had shouted his name from the doorway. Loud enough it had startled her. She breathed easy though, seeing Emma Sue standing in the doorway with the bucket of beans and her apron.
“Go get them,” Bridgette said. “Don’t make her walk out here.”
She waited until he’d taken the items from his wife before she said, “Emma Sue, you go lie down now. We don’t want that baby coming any earlier than necessary.” For the baby’s sake. If it was up to her, the baby would have come shortly after she’d arrived so she could get out of this place and never lay eyes on Cecil again.
Emma Sue waved and stepped back inside the house.
“What are you gonna do with this stuff?” Cecil asked while handing her the bucket and apron.
“Just get me the eggs.” After hooking the bucket handle over one arm, she used the calf as a table. Laying out the apron, she folded the skirt in half, tucked the edges around each other and used the ties to form a makeshift bag. She then dumped in the beans.
Handing the bucket to Cecil, she hooked the strap around her neck and then took the egg baskets from him. One at a time set the baskets in the bag, trying not to smash the beans or jostle the eggs too much. They were now worth more than if she’d taken them to town and sold them to Haskell’s store. Once satisfied the bag would hold, she eased the apron around her side. “Help me,” she told Cecil while holding onto the neck strap that was tightening against her throat with one hand. “Place the bottom of the bag on the swell of the saddle. Right in the middle. Use the beans to level it so it won’t bounce about too much.”