Lassiter Tough Page 9

  However, she was sure that Luis Herrera could handle the situation should it arise. She had known Luis since she was small, and knew him to be a generous, smiling man who could be dangerous if crossed. She felt more comfortable having him as a stable part of her new life as mistress of Box C than if he weren’t on the payroll at all. She could count on him where she knew it was foolish to expect too much from Lassiter.

  Vince Tevis had mentioned him several times, saying with a laugh that Lassiter could stay put just so long, then was off seeking new trails.

  Ever since she had been trying to fall asleep, the name of Lassiter had periodically been rolling around inside her head. Many times during the past hours she had relived the violence of the day, always reaching the conclusion that Lassiter surely was an incredible man. He never gave up when the odds were so against him, even from the start because of Doane’s great size and expertise in the business of bare-knuckle fighting. Obviously, what she had heard was true; her brother had hired Doane in the first place for his punishing fists.

  Lassiter had withstood not only those fists but two thrown bottles that had certainly slowed him for a time. But on both occasions he had bounced back.

  At last she heard the lurching footsteps of her new husband, singing under his breath as he cast off his clothes and climbed into bed. He mumbled something but she couldn’t make out what it was. She assumed it had something to do with now declaring his rights, as her mother used to call it with her nose in the air. Yet her mother had allowed Brad’s father to treat her worse than a peon and had never fought back. Millie had secretly loathed the old man even though he had relented after her mother’s death, and let her live under his roof. He had even sent her away to school, which was a mistake, he had ruefully admitted later. Because an education had put too many grand ideas into her young head, such as declaring the role of females was not ordained from birth at the direction of a father.

  But by then he was old and too engrossed with other problems to exert a firm hand. As a result, she had done more or less as she pleased, to the consternation of the community.

  During his lifetime, Poppa had kept Brad on a tight rein, but upon his death there was no longer a restraint. She knew that Brad planned for a cattle empire no matter how it was achieved, no matter how much blood was spilled. A tremor shot through her at the thought. She thought of Lassiter riding out this evening with such a cold look in his eye that it was frightening. She sensed he was going after Brad even though when she questioned Luis Herrera he was noncommittal.

  “You cold?” her new husband asked thickly.

  “No, Rep.”

  “You shivered.”

  “I … I guess I was a little cold.”

  “You need warmin’ up.”

  She was surprised with all the whiskey he had consumed and the raw emotions stirred up that day by her brother’s rash act that he seemed virile as a young bridegroom. She did her part, hoping to please.

  And when he finally collapsed, a dead weight, he mumbled, “I want us to have a son. I ain’t too old, am I?” There was such a plaintive note in his voice that it tore at her.

  “Of course you’re not, Rep.”

  He gave her a pat on the stomach, then turned awkwardly on his side because of the bad leg. Soon he was snoring.

  The prospect of possibly bearing his child gave her no joy. And she knew it was wrong to feel that way. Had she done him a disservice, after all, in agreeing to the marriage? She only did it to shut Brad up. She knew it was cowardly to be afraid of one’s own kin. But Brad had maneuvered her into this trap and now she would make the best of it. As she had told Lassiter, she would be a good wife to Rep Chandler. It was the very least she could do.

  It was midmorning when from a parlor window she saw Lassiter riding in. He seemed more hunched in the saddle than usual and his face, what she could see of it under the low-pulled brim of his black hat, was a mass of bruises.

  She went flying out to see him. “You’re all right,” she gasped when he dismounted.

  He gave a crooked smile with his bruised mouth. “As well as could be expected, I reckon.”

  “You didn’t run into Brad?” she asked tensely.

  He hesitated and looked away. Even at midmorning, wagons of late sleepers were still rolling out of the yard. Rep had come out to shake the many hands and to wish everyone luck on the trip home.

  “No, I didn’t see Brad.”

  She blew out her breath. “Well, that’s a relief.”

  He was still showing her that crooked grin which tore at her heart. And his blue eyes seemed to bore into her. Be careful, Millie, she warned herself. You’re no longer fourteen and now you’re a married woman.

  “You look mighty well this mornin’, Mrs. Chandler,” he said.

  It was the first time he had called her by her new name. She liked the way he said it. “Thank you, Lassiter. I wish I could say the same about you.” They laughed together.

  That afternoon he loafed around the home place. It gave her a chance to talk to him. But it became awkward when she tried to pry into his past life. He turned the subject to Vince Tevis.

  “Vince said you and he were trying to find your aunt.”

  “We were. Aunt Marguerite, my mother’s sister. But she’d moved from Las Cruces and I was told she’d gone to Ardon. But I don’t know whether she was there or not. I never had a chance to find out. Brad came … and well, you know the rest.”

  Two days later Lassiter was in town with the Chandlers when he saw Joe Tige just crossing the street down the block. The burly Diamond Eight rider was about to enter the saddle shop when Lassiter stepped up. Tige looked surprised, then scowled.

  Lassiter said, “I want my gun.”

  “I don’t know what the hell you’re talkin’ about,” Tige snarled. He started to step around him and enter the saddle shop, but Lassiter blocked him.

  “The day of the wedding. You took my gun. I want it.”

  Drinkers had come out of O’Leary’s across the street to stare at them. It crossed Lassiter’s mind that some of them might be Diamond Eight. But at the moment he didn’t give much of a damn if they were.

  “You’re crazy as hell,” Tige blustered. “I never took no gun.”

  Lassiter’s eyes finally lowered to the man’s holster nestled against a thick thigh. He saw a familiar gun butt with black grips protruding from the leather.

  “It’s a good gun,” Lassiter went on. “You must think so, too. You’re wearin’ it.”

  Tige looked at him for a moment, then his thick lips stretched tight in a grin. “Try an’ take it… .”

  That was as far as he got. The .45 borrowed from Herrera appeared in Lassiter’s hand, the hammer eared back. Tige came to his toes, a look of surprise on his brutal face.

  “Don’t bother to hand it over,” Lassiter said softly. “I’ll just take it.”

  Ramming the muzzle of the cocked .45 against Tige’s side, he reached out with his left hand and retrieved the .44.

  Tige, muttering under his breath, entered the saddle shop and slammed the door. The owner, who had observed the incident through the fly-specked front window, was ashen-faced.

  When Lassiter walked back to the Hartney Store where he had left his horse beside the Chandler wagon, the rancher came out to the loading platform and said, “What was that all about?”

  “He borrowed my gun the other day. I wanted it back.”

  “When I saw you headin’ for him, I kept my fingers crossed. Tige’s got a hair-trigger temper. Let’s go get us a drink. The missus, she’s got some stuff she wants to buy. You know how women are. Can’t make up their minds.”

  Chandler smiled and gave a playful tug at one end of his mustache. How easily Chandler was fitting into the role of husband, Lassiter thought. But then he’d had years of practice with his late wife.

  Chandler stuck his head in the door and spoke to Millie, who was looking at yard goods by the strong light of a front window.

  Isobel
Hartney, a pencil behind her ear, stepped to the door. “You’re looking some better, Lassiter, than you did the other day.”

  “Some,” he agreed and looked at her. Today she wore a big apron and her yellow hair was parted in the center and drawn back severely from her pretty face and done up in a knot at the back. Her eyes were lively, her smile seductive, the way she kept running the tip of her tongue lovingly along the lower lip. Lassiter wondered if she’d seen Brad Sanlee. Probably.

  “Rep’s right about Tige,” she said. “He has a nasty disposition. He won’t like it that you relieved him of a gun, yours or not.”

  “I’ll keep one eye open for him,” Lassiter said. “And the other eye on more pleasant things.” He gave her a direct look. Then, with a wave of the hand, he was walking with Chandler toward O’Leary’s.

  It was ten in the morning and this time of day there were only two other drinkers in the large saloon. Aswamper was dismantling the big pot-bellied stove near the center of the room, cleaning out the winter buildup of soot. It wouldn’t be used again till fall. Lassiter felt he would be long gone by then.

  Chandler spoke in a heavy voice as he mentioned Brad Sanlee and poured whiskey for them. “Brad ain’t foolin’ me none,” he said in a low voice. “I know that with me marryin’ up with his kid sister that he figures to get a foot in the door at Box C.”

  Lassiter had told him as much before the wedding. But he didn’t bring it up to Chandler. He savored the good whiskey, staring out a rear window at the unending miles of brush that stretched south from Santos.

  Chandler said, “Well, Brad’s got another think comin’. It’s why I wanted a tough foreman like you.”

  Lassiter felt uncomfortable, sensing what was coming next. Chandler would outline the many reasons why he should stick around.

  “In one way it’s a good thing I busted my leg,” the rancher was saying. He was waiting for Lassiter to say, “Why so?” But Lassiter remained silent.

  “Bein’ laid up with my leg gives me time to chew things over, Lassiter. I know damn well Brad had gone to hunt Millie down. An’ knowin’ Brad, I figured he’d bring her back sooner or later.”

  “And he sure did,” Lassiter put in, thinking of Vince Tevis.

  “I tell you, Lassiter, the fight you put up with that bastard Doane was one of the best examples of pure guts I ever did see. How you stood up to him I’ll never know. But you sure did.”

  “I had no choice. Either stand up to him or have my skull busted like a dropped melon.”

  Chandler smiled at that, then grew serious. “I’m gonna do my damnedest to get Millie with child. I want a son so bad I can purely taste it.”

  That kind of talk about Millie was disturbing to Lassiter. He didn’t like to think of Millie’s sweet young body entwined with the creaking framework that housed the spirit of Rep Chandler. He wondered if Chandler at his age was still up to fathering an offspring.

  “I need a son to carry on,” Chandler said and started to refill Lassiter’s glass.

  But Lassiter put a hand over it. “I need a clear head in case Tige wants to start anything.”

  “Yeah.” He refilled his own glass, then started talking again about a son. Then he seemed to descend into a black mood. “Likely, I won’t be around to see him grow. But you will.”

  “Now wait a minute there… . That’s years away and …”

  But Chandler rode right over the objection he was about to voice. “I’m countin’ on you, Lassiter. All the way.”

  “We’ll see,” was all that Lassiter felt like saying at the moment.

  “A man with my years on his back oughta know better’n to try an’ bust a mustang. But I did. That’s where I got my busted leg. An’ while I was layin’ there thinkin’, I got out the ranch books. Things kinda gone to hell since Bertha died. I ain’t been payin’ much attention. But it seems I owe a hell of a lot of money to a bank up at San Antone.”

  “You had a good cattle sale,” Lassiter said, mentioning the $74,000 he had brought back from Tiempo.

  “I reckon that’ll help … some.”

  Lassiter didn’t have time to dwell on it because he looked over his shoulder and saw Tige leave the saddle shop and start across the street toward O’Leary’s. Lassiter tensed when the big man swaggered right up to the swinging doors. He was about to open them but peered over the tops and saw Lassiter. They locked eyes for a moment.

  Then Tige said, “Be seein’ you,” in a threatening tone.

  He wheeled from the double doors and stormed away, his boots rapping the boardwalk with such force it seemed he had a personal vendetta against the planks underfoot. He got his horse and headed down the street in the direction of Diamond Eight.

  Chandler, oblivious to what had gone on, was talking about the years that stretched ahead. They would be good years, he said, with Millie having a bunch of kids to keep her happy. But again Lassiter reminded himself that he had no intention of being tied down for years on a Texas ranch deep in the brasada. Chandler would just have to understand when the day of parting was at hand.

  But it seems that mortal men seldom realize fulfillment of the grand plans they have made. Rep Chandler was no exception. Tragedy’s shadow began to loom ominously over the Texas brush country a week later.

  Chandler was over east near the boundary of Kilhaven’s Slash K when Brad Sanlee, mounted on a big grulla, rode out of a mesquite thicket. “Rep, I got somethin’ to tell you,” Sanlee said gravely. “Alone.”

  Chandler frowned a moment. Five of his vaqueros were accompanying him as they moved a small bunch of Box C cows to better grass. Chandler told them to go on ahead, that he’d catch up. Then he added, just to be on the safe side, in case Brad had any skullduggery up his sleeve, “If I ain’t caught up to you in ten minutes, you come lookin’ for me.” A warning to Sanlee, just in case.

  They looked from Chandler to Sanlee and nodded.

  When they were again pushing the small herd, Sanlee said, “There was no need to do that, Rep. You act like I might do somethin’ to you.”

  “What’s on your mind, Brad?”

  “Hell, we’re kinfolks, you an’ me. I’m your brother-in-law. You can’t forget that.” Sanlee sat with his big hands folded over the scuffed horn of his saddle. “I’ve been hearin’ talk I don’t like, Rep.”

  Chandler felt a stiffness in his shoulders. “What kind of talk?”

  “Now it’s between you an’ me, Rep. She’s my sister an’ all that, but I feel obliged to look after my new brother-in-law… .”

  “What in hell do you mean, Brad?” Chandler demanded coldly.

  “It’s talk I’ve been hearin’ that I don’t like.”

  “For Chris’ sakes, get to the point!”

  “It’s about her an’ Lassiter.”

  Chandler swallowed and turned his head to focus on a cluster of yellow blossoms against the green of the brush. “I don’t want to hear another damn word, Brad.” His voice shook. He gathered the reins in his left hand, preparing to ride on, his eyes raking Sanlee’s bearded face.

  “I’d keep my eyes open all the same. I know that sister of mine pretty damn well. I ought to. I grew up with her.”

  With that, he turned his grulla and galloped off, his wide shoulders tight in a Texas brush jacket, hat on the back of his head. It crossed Chandler’s mind how easy it would be to put a bullet in that broad back and end that gutter talk. He hoped to God that Lassiter didn’t get wind of it and go trying to avenge the Chandler family honor. He knew that Lassiter thought a heap of Millie and she of him, which was only natural, Chandler told himself, as he began riding slowly through the brush to catch up with his men. He could hear the sounds of cattle trampling the brush as they were moved out. Sure, Millie liked Lassiter because he was her husband’s foreman. Nothing more than that. Not one damn thing more than that.

  When he got home late that afternoon he saw that Lassiter had finished up early. He was at the corral, standing straddle-legged, holding the end of a lead rop
e attached to the bridle of a small pinto. Aboard the pinto was Luis Herrera’s ten-year-old nephew, who was on a visit. Lassiter was teaching him to ride bareback.

  Looking on was Millie.

  As Chandler reined in to watch the fun from a distance, the boy slipped sideways and was pitched off. Lassiter instantly snatched him from the ground. From what Rep could see of Millie, she was smiling broadly. She had both arms draped over a pole in the corral. Her black hair was in two braids hanging down her slender back. She looked like a young girl. Chandler’s heart went out to her. But a moment later he froze as she groped between the corral bars and caught Lassiter by the hand. She said something to him and they both laughed.

  Then she saw Chandler riding up. “You work hard today? I fix you a good supper.” At times, he noticed, when she was excited about something, she took on the speech colorations of her late half-breed mother.

  He swung down and one of the vaqueros took his horse. Millie slung an arm around his waist as they walked to the house together. “Lassiter was telling Jaime that he should know how to ride bareback in case he is ever out someplace without a saddle… .”

  “That’s Herrera’s job,” Chandler interrupted. “To teach his nephew.” He spoke so gruffly that Millie removed her arm and looked up at him with a frown. His mouth was a grim line under the mustache.

  “How cold you sounded just then, Rep.”

  “What’s for supper?”

  Midway through the meal, she said off-handedly, “Lassiter’s taking the big wagon to town tomorrow to pick up supplies. I thought I’d ride with him. I want to get some more yard goods to match the sample I got the other day. I think it’s a lovely shade of blue… .” She broke off, staring through the light of double candles to Chandler’s tight face. “Rep, what’s the matter?”

  “Nothin’,” he said grumpily.

  “But I …” She drew a deep breath. “You told me last night it would take three or four days to move cattle to where you want them. I just thought that as long as Lassiter was going to town anyway … and you said I shouldn’t ride alone because of Brad …”