One Bright Morning (26 page)

“
Miserable ass,” Mulrooney
muttered as he snatched the piece of paper out of the poor man’s
hand. The man turned tail and ran back out of the door as soon as
his errand was complete.

Even before Mulrooney finished reading the
words on the paper, Ferrett and Pelch had started backing away from
him toward the door. They recognized the symptoms their employer
was displaying, and wanted to be well out of the way when the
eruption occurred.

Because Mulrooney’s face had turned almost
black. His jowls quivered. His pig eyes bulged. Even his thin,
yellow-white hair, which generally lay in sparse strings across his
enormous head, seemed to bristle in anger. By the time he lifted
his eyes from the paper to pin his underlings with a stab of fury,
Ferrett and Pelch had backed themselves flat against the door.

Mulrooney raised the piece of paper in one
ham-like fist and shook it at the two men.

“
Do you know what this wire
says, you miserable, slimy pip-squeaks?” His voice was clogged with
malevolence.

“
N-no, sir,” whispered
Ferrett.

Pelch could only shake his head.

“
They’ve
gone
!”

Their boss’s bellow made both men jump.

Mulrooney slammed the paper onto the table
in front of him. His entire body vibrated with anger.

“
They’ve gone,” he
repeated.

“
G-gone, sir?” ventured
Ferrett. He didn’t know whether it would be better to talk or not
to talk. He was eyeing Mulrooney with fear and caution, ready to
duck should his boss decide to throw something.

“
Gone,” Mulrooney affirmed.
“They aren’t in New Mexico anymore.” His furious voice then assumed
a sing-song quality, as though he were mocking Jubal Green and his
band who were trying to escape his wrath. “No. They’re not there
any longer. They’ve gone to Texas. Back to El Paso.”

Ferrett and Pelch looked at one another.
Pelch appeared to be almost relieved, as though he were glad his
arrangements hadn’t managed to get anybody else killed yet.

Mulrooney stood up then, and Ferrett and
Pelch shrank further back against the door.

“
But they won’t get away
from me,” said Mulrooney, staking his two employees to the door
with his vicious gaze. “No, they can’t escape
my
revenge. I’ll get
them.”

Then he turned and glared around his
carriage as though looking for somebody to murder. Ferrett shut his
eyes in an agony of suspense.

Suddenly Mulrooney whirled around again. His
sausage-shaped arm swept out and tore across the table top in front
of him like a hurricane ripping through a Florida key. Everything
on the table—papers, pens, books, teacup, teapot, and tray—went
flying through the air and crashed up against the wall. China
shattered and tea splattered everywhere, coating wall, furniture,
and papers with warm, sweet, poisoned brown liquid.

Ferrett and Pelch looked at each other with
blank dismay.

Mulrooney eyed the mess he had created with
fury, then slammed his porky hands down on the table.

“
Well?” he roared. “What are
you two blithering fools waiting for? Clean this mess
up!”

When the two men finally left Mulrooney’s
carriage and carried the shattered remains of their failure away
from the scene of their attempted crime, Ferrett looked very
depressed. So did Pelch.

“
I’ll never have the nerve
to try again, I’m afraid, Mr. Pelch,” mumbled Ferrett, as though
his inability to commit murder lightly were a miserable
failing.

Pelch shook his head sadly. “Nor I, Mr.
Ferrett, I’m afraid. Nor I.”

Chapter Eleven

Jubal, Dan, and Four Toes ultimately decided
that it would be better to travel during the late afternoon and
night as long as the weather was this hot. They had a lot of desert
to cover on the way to their destination, and it was going to be
rough going, no matter when they did it. But they all three agreed
that crossing those arid miles would be easier on all of them,
including the cattle, if they did it at night. Maggie approved of
their idea.

“
Oh, I think that would be
much better,” she declared, happy at the thought. “Annie gets so
hot, and there’s no way to cool her off. Poor baby.”

Annie was, at the moment, asleep in her
mother’s arms. They were all gathered under some cottonwoods that
graced the banks of Turkey Creek and afforded the little glen a
modicum of cool shade. They had eaten a light lunch of hard bread
sticks and dried beef. Maggie had also handed out slices of dried
apples that she’d brought with them. The apple slices were tasty,
and the men appreciated the fruit, which was a rare treat for them.
It felt good to relax and listen to the gurgling of the little
river as it tumbled over rocks on its way to wherever it was
headed.

Four Toes stretched and yawned. “Well, I
guess we’d better try to get some sleep now, then, since we’re
going to be traveling tonight.”

“
Yeah,” agreed
Jubal.

“
Well, my goodness, Mr.
Smith and Mr. Green, the two of you were up most of the night, too,
weren’t you?” Maggie asked, remembering how they had guarded the
camp so assiduously the night before.

Four Toes grinned at her. “Actually, Mrs.
Bright, we all took turns. Dan here took the watch after us.”

“
Oh,” said Maggie
thoughtfully. “I guess I didn’t realize traveling in these parts
required so much vigilance.”

“
Well, it normally doesn’t,
ma’am,” said Dan. “We just want to make sure Mulrooney’s hired guns
don’t take us unawares.”

“
Oh,” said Maggie again.
She’d almost forgot about Mulrooney.

They all lay down under the cottonwoods.
Maggie spread a quilt for herself and Annie to share because she
didn’t want to get any more dirty than she already was. The men
disdained such luxury, but laid down with their heads upon their
saddles. Maggie only looked at them and shook her head and pondered
the oddities of men. They were such strange creatures.

She woke up an hour or so later and wondered
where she was and why she felt so content. When her eyes blinked
open and she remembered her circumstances, she smiled. It didn’t
seem quite right, to be so happy when somebody wanted to kill her,
but Maggie decided she wouldn’t worry about the inconsistencies of
life right at the moment.

She sat up, peered around under the trees at
her traveling companions, and almost laughed when she noticed that
Annie had got up while her mama slept and wandered over to where
Four Toes lay. He had shaken out a saddle blanket for her to lie
upon, and she was curled up next to him now, asleep, with one of
the toys he had carved for her tucked up under her chin.

Maggie felt really sticky and dirty. She’d
been sweating all morning, and the wagon had churned up clouds of
dust that now clung to the dried sweat on her body and made her
itch. It was a very uncomfortable feeling for Maggie, who was used
to being clean, and she didn’t like it. She eyed Turkey Creek
speculatively.

I bet I could take a bath
while the men sleep
, she mused.

Very quietly, she got up and tiptoed to the
wagon where she dug out a cake of the lye soap she had made earlier
in the winter, a towel, clean linen, and a clean shirtwaist. Then
she tiptoed away from the camp through the cottonwoods, searching
out a spot where she could bathe in private but which would still
be close enough to the camp so that she could hear if the men began
to stir.

When she finally found a spot that was
secluded enough, it was a little further away from the camp than
Maggie liked. But the thought of being clean again was so appealing
that she decided she just couldn’t bear being dirty any longer. She
stripped off her dusty clothes until she wore only her drawers and
camisole, then waded into the stream.

“
Shoot, it’s cold,” she
muttered through chattering teeth. But she resolutely walked into
the river up to her knees. Up to her knees was as deep as the creek
got in these parts. Shivering in the cold water, Maggie began to
wash herself.

Jubal didn’t know what prompted him to crick
his eyes open when he did. All he knew was that some strange
feeling suddenly came over him, and he woke up. It was a feeling of
loneliness mushed up with an odd sense of danger, and it jerked him
wide awake all of a sudden. He blinked a couple of times and sat
up, trying to keep the groans of pain that always accompanied that
activity to himself.

Damn, maybe I’m just
getting old
, was his first sour thought.
Then he decided he was probably only dismayed because healing up
was taking longer than he wanted it to. That thought cheered him
momentarily, until he glanced over to Maggie’s quilt and saw that
she was gone.

Then he was on his feet so fast, he didn’t
have time to hurt. He quickly glanced around their little resting
spot, taking in the sight of Annie nestled next to Four Toes, Dan
and Four Toes snoring soundly under the trees, and their cattle
relaxing near the creek, munching weeds and dozing.

Jubal swore silently as he yanked on his
boots and picked up his Winchester. He tried to be quiet when he
scanned the area for tracks. He had no trouble picking up Maggie’s,
and he followed them out of the camp and down the stream, muttering
foul oaths to himself the whole time.

# # #

“
Maybe it wouldn’t be so
cold if I sat in it. Then I’d probably get used to it,” Maggie said
to herself.

So she sat down in the middle of the stream.
Sure enough, after the first shock of cold, her body seemed to
adjust better that way, when it was nearly submerged, than it had
when she had merely been throwing frigid water over herself.

“
I’m probably getting numb
and freezing to death,” she muttered as she began to wash her hair.
“Still,” she said with a grin for herself and the hot spring day,
“it feels good to be clean.”

Jubal came upon her bathing place just as
Maggie stood up and flung the wet mane of hair out of her face. His
breath caught and he felt all at once as though somebody had just
punched him, hard, in the gut.

The spot Maggie had chosen was just past a
bend in the creek where the river widened into a little pool, and
it was overhung by cottonwood branches. A couple of big rocks baked
in the sun beside the stream, and she had placed her clean clothes
neatly on one of the warm rocks. She had slung her towel over a
cottonwood branch, and she reached for it now as Jubal watched, too
stunned to turn away as a gentleman should.

Rays of sunshine streamed through the tree
branches, sort of like they did in religious pictures Jubal had
seen in churches. They splayed out like a fan over Maggie, bathing
her in rich amber light and dancing on the rippling water like
diamonds.

Unlike Maggie, Jubal’s eyesight was perfect,
and he could see every sweet curve of her shapely body as her
camisole and drawers clung wetly to her skin. Her legs were works
of art, Jubal noticed, and he swallowed hard. Her belly was just
barely rounded—enough to show that she was a woman. Her hips were
firm and round and curved like ripe fruit. And her breasts—Jubal
had to close his eyes hard for a second.

When he reopened them, those breasts were
still there and still just as beautiful as he had thought they
were. They weren’t large, but they were perfect, firm, round globes
that sat high and perky. The cold, wet fabric of Maggie’s thin
camisole molded over them like a second skin, and her nipples had
puckered and hardened and rode the tips of her breasts like two
succulent cherries. Jubal had an almost overwhelming longing to
taste them.

“
Oh, great God,” he
whispered to himself. His body’s reaction to this visual feast was
instant. Almost immediately, his denim trousers were nearly too
tight to hold his swelling, hardening flesh.

“
Damn,” he
murmured.

He was torn by many emotions just then. He
was furious with Maggie for wandering away from their camp by
herself. He was angry with himself at his reaction to her. And,
more than anything else, he wanted to stomp down there, right into
the river, pick Maggie Bright up, carry her over to the grassy
riverbank, and have his way with her.

He had just decided that anger was the
safest emotion to act upon at the moment and was bracing himself
for a good holler, when a sudden furious crashing erupted from the
trees opposite the creek bank where he stood.

Maggie heard it, too, and stopped, frozen,
in the act of pulling her wet camisole over her head.

Jubal had torn down the bank, raced through
the river, grabbed Maggie up in his arms, and flattened them both
out on the ground before either one of them knew what the noise was
that had frightened them. As they lay on the bank, stunned by fear
and Jubal’s sudden action, they turned their eyes toward where the
sound had come from. The white flash of a deer’s tail could be
discerned as the animal, alarmed when it came to the water to drink
and found Maggie bathing, raced off through the trees.

Jubal’s rifle was primed and ready for use
the second he knew that Maggie was safely covered by his body. His
heart was knocking a hole through his chest by the time he saw the
deer, realized the animal had made the noise, lowered the gun, and
looked down at Maggie.

She was staring up at him in stark terror.
“Mr. Green!” she squeaked.

Jubal shut his eyes tight and took a deep
breath to keep himself from throttling her. Then he looked down at
her once more and had to shut his eyes again when he realized he
was lying on her in a very intimate way, and that those breasts of
hers that he had so admired were naked and pressing against his
chest. Her body was cool under his, and his reaction to the feel of
her was even more violent than his reaction to the sight of her had
been.