Dorothy Garlock - [Wabash River] (12 page)

“Does Birdsall know about the preacher wanting to give Colin to Renshaw?”

“I don’t know. He doesn’t kowtow to Preacher Sikes as some of the others do.”

Barking dogs of various sizes and breeds came out from under the house and surrounded them when they approached it. A word from the white-haired, white-bearded man who sat in the chair on the porch sent them scurrying away, but they didn’t go far—they sat in the yard eyeing the visitors suspiciously.

The log house, which looked as if it had been there forever, was wide and boxy with a sloping roof that covered porches both in the front and the back. Rock chimneys on each end towered above the roof top. To the side of the house was a peach orchard and a well-tended garden with string suspended across it from end to end with tiny bits of fluttering cloth tied to it to scare away the birds.

John stopped his horse at the split-rail hitching post, helped Addie down, then stepped from the saddle. He followed her to the porch.

“Afternoon, Mr. Birdsall.”

“Howdy, Addie,” the old man replied, his eyes going beyond her to John.

“This is Mr. Tallman, a . . . friend.”

“Howdy.” John stepped forward and extended his hand.

“Don’t meet many people by the name of Tallman. Met a feller by that name once over near Fort Smith. ’Twas a long time ago.”

“It could have been my father, Rain Tallman. He came into this country forty years ago.”

“Yup, guess it was. Ya favor him some, now that I think on it. Sit down, sit down.” After indicating the well-worn cane-bottomed chairs, he turned his head and yelled into the house, “Cloris!”

A chubby, pleasant-faced woman stepped out the door so quickly that it was apparent she had been lurking there.

“Hello, Addie.”

“Hello, Cloris. This is Mr. Tallman.” Then, to John: “Cloris is married to Alfred, one of Mr. Birdsall’s sons.”

“Would ya like a cool drink?”

“That would be nice,” Addie murmured.

“I know this ain’t no pass-the-time visit, Addie,” Mr. Birdsall said as soon as Cloris had left the porch. “What’s on your mind?”

Addie took a deep breath. “Are you still interested in buying my farm?”

“Are ya ready to sell, or just dillydallyin’ ’round ’bout it?”

“I’m ready to sell. Today.”

“Why today?”

“Well . . . I just—”

“She’s getting married,” John said smoothly; then, to Addie when she turned startled eyes to him: “I think we should tell him the truth, honey. Mr. Birdsall, Addie’s afraid folks will look down on her for marrying again so soon after hearing about Kirby.”

Cloris came out with a bucket of water. After Addie drank, she handed the dipper to John.

“Mighty good water,” he said after a few gulps.

“Best in the Ozarks.” Mr. Birdsall waited until Cloris went back in the house before he asked again: “Why today?”

“I’m leaving to go back to my ranch in New Mexico and I want to take Addie with me. I’ve contracted to act as scout for a wagon train that’s waiting for me.”

Addie was speechless. The man could lie so glibly.

“Envy ya some. When I come here it was new country. Orbie Johnson, that’s Addie’s pa, come a few years later. Fer a spell we was the only ones. Then others came. Trash with ’em,” he grunted. “Good hard worker, Orbie was. He helped me plant them peach trees just before he was took. Orbie’d be glad to know Addie’s gettin’ a good man. That other feller she wed didn’t ’mount to a hill of beans.”

For crying out loud! How did Birdsall know John Tallman was a
good
man? Addie asked herself. And how did he know that Kirby didn’t amount to a hill of beans? She opened her mouth to ask, then closed it when she saw John looking at her intently, his dark blue eyes warning her to keep quiet. She clamped her mouth shut, but her violet eyes were resentful.

“Guess Sikes’ll be ’long to take them orphans off yore hands. Hear Renshaw’ll take the boy. Cloris’s been askin’ ’bout the girl. Don’t know, though, she’d have to grow some ’fore she’d be much help.”

“Colin and Jane Ann are going with me,” Addie said firmly. “I . . . ah, explained to Mr. Tallman that I couldn’t part with them. Mr. Birdsall, about the farm—”

“Sir, we’ve talked it over,” John interrupted smoothly. “There’s fifteen acres in cotton, ten in corn. An acre of broom straw and a acre of garden. Barn’s in good shape and there’s a good water well. Addie will leave what household furniture we can’t take with us, as well as the milk cow and the sheep.”

“Not the sheep!”

“Now, honey—”

“Not the sheep!” she insisted.

John winked at Mr. Birdsall. “We figure six hundred cash money a fair price.”

Six hundred?
Addie almost choked. She had meant to ask only three hundred.

“That’s a mighty steep price for cash money.”

“Not the way things are going. By this time next year you’ll be able to get twelve hundred for that farm. I’ll tell you what we can do. Throw in a heavy wagon and a couple of good mules to pull it, and we’ll come down to four-fifty cash money.”

“I don’t know—”

John was silent. His eyes caught Addie’s and held them. The silence built. Birdsall rubbed the whiskers on his chin.

“I don’t know,” he said again.

“There’s another fellow that’s interested, but Addie—”

“Four.”

“Four-twenty-five, and I pick the mules.”

“Done.” Mr. Birdsall stretched out his hand to John, then heaved himself to his feet and stepped off the porch.

Addie was amazed. The two men had completely disregarded her during the whole process of selling
her
farm.

She and John followed Mr. Birdsall to the barn lot in back of his house. John took Addie’s elbow and squeezed it briefly before he went to look at the mules.

A half-hour later, Addie sat on the wagon seat while John tied his horse to the tailgate. After she had signed the farm over to Mr. Birdsall, he had given John a bill of sale for the wagon and the mules, plus a bag of money, which John had counted and then put in his inside vest pocket.

Cloris Birdsall came out to the wagon. “Good luck, Addie. Pappy said Alfred and I can live on your place. I’m so excited . . . and tired a sharin’ a place with kinfolk,” she added in a whisper.

“Take care of the moss rose,” Addie said in a choked voice. “The hollyhocks come up each year, but I scatter seed anyhow. Daisy’s a good cow, but sometimes you have to poke her in the side with your . . . head—”

“Ready?” John put his foot between two spokes of the wheel and jumped up onto the seat beside Addie, where he took up the reins.

She nodded, too emotional to speak.

Mr. Birdsall came to the wagon and extended his hand.

“It ain’t gonna be like strangers takin’ over your place, Addie. Orbie knew I was fond a that place.”

“Papa’d be glad you have it. Goodbye, Mr. Birdsall.”

“We’re obliged to you,” John said. Then: “You might want to send some of your boys down to the farm tonight. We’ll be leaving about dusk. I’d not put it past the Renshaw outfit to come in and shoot things up if they hear we’ve gone.”

“By golly, it’ll be the last place they shoot up if they do. Them Renshaws ain’t got enough brains between ’em to fill a gnat’s eye.”

“I agree with you there. Good day to you.”

John sailed the whip out over the backs of the mules, and the wagon rolled away from the homestead. Addie sat beside him, stiff as a poker, her eyes straight ahead. As soon as they were out of sight of the Birdsall house, she whirled to face him.

“Why did you tell him
that?
” she demanded. Her eyes burned with resentment, and her voice rose despite her wish to stay calm.

John’s dark brows drew together as he looked searchingly into her eyes. Ignoring her anger, he spoke gently.

“Tell him what?”

“You know!”

“That we were going to marry? Is the thought of marrying me so terrible?”

“But . . . it’s a lie.”

“Maybe; but it worked, didn’t it? We came out far better than I thought we would. I saw this wagon when we first came up the lane. You’d play hob, trying to fit your stuff in the one you have. Let’s hope it doesn’t rain before we can get a set of good strong bows and a wagon sheet.”

“It wasn’t right to lie to Mr. Birdsall,” Addie insisted. “You just took over and—sold my farm. I didn’t have any part in it.”

Surprise altered John’s expression. “Is that what’s bothering you? You’ve got to be the one who wears the pants in the family?”

“We’re not a family!” Addie almost shouted.

“Mr. Birdsall thought we were. Could you have made a better deal? What were you going to ask? Two, three hundred?”

His guess was so close that it took away some of Addie’s resentment. Her violet eyes flicked up at him. His face had a harshness that made her shiver. Addie prided herself on being fair-minded. In spite of his arrogant attitude and domineering style, she owed him a debt of gratitude.

“I thank you for what you did, Mr. Tallman. Please forgive me for being touchy.” She lowered her eyes to her hands, which were clasped tightly in her lap. She felt his eyes on her and it made her nervous.

“Don’t pull such a long face. You got what you wanted and a wagon and team to boot.”

“I know, but it isn’t every day I . . . sell my home.” Her voice cracked. To hide her humiliation she concentrated on holding on to the side of the wagon seat because the team had picked up speed.

“Then why did you? You could have sent Trisha up North; Colin could have gone with her, and your troubles would have been over.”

It was the wrong thing to say, he realized. Addie’s face turned a dull red, her eyes blazed angrily, and she completely forgot her feeling of gratitude.

“Get rid of my troubles? Just send them away without a thought of what would happen to them? Is that what
you
do with your troubles, Mr. Tallman? Out of sight, out of mind? Well, I take my responsibilities more seriously than that.”

He smiled. “You’re quite a woman. I’m going to enjoy getting to know you.” He placed his foot on the front board and pulled back on the reins to slow the team. They were coming to a sharp bend in the trail.

“Bullfoot! You know me now as well as you ever will.”

His smile broadened. Such admiration and implacable determination shone in his dark blue eyes that Addie shivered, even though she was sweating with anger.

“You need me, Addie. I’m all that stands between you and the Renshaws. For some reason that God only knows, our paths crossed. It may be that fate intends for us to know each other . . . very well.” He spoke calmly, as if he really believed such a ridiculous notion.

It was quiet except for the creak of the wagon and the jingle of the harnesses, but John’s words roared loudly in her head:
know each other very well.
Why, the nerve of him!
He’s got mush for brains,
she thought wildly.

“Fate indeed!” she sputtered. “You’re out of your mind if you believe that poppycock!” She’d wanted to say something that would really cut him down, but she realized she had failed when she looked into his laughing eyes. “You’re crazy as a bedbug.”

“Maybe. Climb down off your high horse and tell me about your husband. Mr. Birdsall didn’t seem to think much of him.”

“My husband is a subject I’ll not discuss with you, now or ever.”

Somehow, Addie felt strangely alive. She put it down to the fact that she hadn’t conversed with an interesting man in months, even years. She begrudgingly admitted that she enjoyed talking to him; but this other thing, this feeling of being alive when she was with him, this seeing his face behind her closed eyelids, disturbed her. And, Lord help her, she was glad, oh so glad, that he was with her.

John wasn’t sure why he had said those things to her. He didn’t even believe them himself. He had been taught to believe that a man made his own track through life. It was up to him whether to cut a straight one or a crooked one. He also believed that there was no such thing as luck. A man made his own.

He glanced at the woman beside him. It irritated him that he liked to look at her. She was delicate and elusive, yet strong. She had backbone, all right, and would buck a man every step of the way if she believed herself to be right. He admired her deep loyalty to Trisha and the boy, and even to her husband, who Birdsall had said wasn’t worth a hill of beans.

John wondered if she would be a passionate lover. Abruptly, he felt bitter resentment rising in him. Hell! He hadn’t planned to be interested in a woman for a long time, especially a woman with extra baggage. Her own son was one thing, but there was also the boy, his sister, and Trisha—a ready-made family to fill that big house of his out on his ranch.
Now where the hell did that thought come from?
In his mind’s eye he saw Addie there in the shaded courtyard—a full skirt swishing around her bare ankles, her hair hanging to her waist, and a dark-haired babe astride her hip.

Holy damn! This was serious business that was going through his mind. Was it just that he needed a woman? He had always been choosy about the women he was with and had gone for long stretches without finding relief with any of the bangtails that were so readily available at most saloons.

He was certain of one thing: The sight of Addie Hyde made his heart jump as no other woman had ever done, and he was stunned by the intensity of his desire to take care of her. She was a full, mature woman, fiery in character, bright in mind, and high in spirit. Her body was straight and strong, yet incredibly soft. It would be very easy to care for her a great deal.

“Ohhh!” The exclamation that burst from Addie jarred John out of his reverie. His strong hands on the reins had turned the mules up the lane to the house. “Oh, my! I just realized that . . . I can’t possibly handle these mules!”

“Stop worrying. You’ll not have to handle them.”

“But—” Addie stopped suddenly and looked at the man beside her. He sat as still as a stone, his eyes searching each side of the lane and ahead. He was as alert as a stallion protecting his herd. “What is it?”

“Someone’s here. If I tell you to get down, do it, and don’t argue.”

“How do you know? I don’t see—”