The Lady and the Cowboy (8 page)

“They won’t mind, dear.”

“Perhaps not but I will. Please can we turn back?”

He looked a little annoyed for a moment, then smiled at her. “Of course we can, anything you want.”

“So, what do you do for a living, Mr Middleton?” she asked to be polite.

“Please call me Tobias, and I do a little of everything I suppose.”

“Such as?”

“Oh, you know.”

“Not really, no.”

He huffed.
“Well, I loan money to people the bank won't, I support new business ventures; I suppose you could say I am a Bank.”

Ruth didn’t know that people other than banks could loan money.

“So, how long have you been here, Ruth?” he asked.

She disliked his use of her Christian name but answered anyway. “In the country
for seven weeks but only on the ranch for a little over a month. Then our Atlantic crossing took two weeks; we hit some very rough seas unfortunately.”

“We?” he asked, with a little too much interest.

“A servant journeyed with me.”

“You had servants back home then?”

“Of course.”

“Must be quite a shock to the system then, coming here. Oh, people
like me have servants but life on a ranch, that must be difficult for you.”

Ruth realised that he was trying to put Sam
down but instead she felt it was a slight on Mamma.

“We have a servant, Cassy.”

“Just the one?” he sounded snide.

“Unless you count the cook
-come-caretaker, who takes care of the ranch hands.”

“Of course,” he nodded
appeasingly. “I seem to have upset you, when all I intended to do was sympathise with your plight.”

‘Plight?’
she thought.
‘I have never felt so free as the past two days on the ranch.’

“I do not consider myself to be in a plight, Mr Middleton.”

“No?” his tone implied that he didn’t believe her.

“I rather consider it an adventure.”

“Really?”

“Yes.”

“Well, of course. I'm sure Mamma looks after you very well. I just thought that you might have had trouble adjusting, after all, you were a Lady in England, were you not? I just thought that you might feel more comfortable, being among your own class for a while.”

She may have disliked many things about being
raised to become a Lady, but for this man to suggest that he was of her class was simply ridiculous.

“Mr Middleton, you clearly know nothing of class!
” she removed her hand from his elbow and turned to face him. “You introduced yourself without waiting for an introduction, you offered me your hand like any common tradesman, you refer to me by my Christian name, despite the fact that I have not given you permission, you are overly familiar and you seek to belittle others. For the record, I am Lady Adams, Dowager Viscountess of Marwich and you, Sir, are no gentleman.”

She walked off towards the general store, hoping that the cart was still around the corner
, where they had left the horses tethered to the store’s hitching post. Sam was just loading some bags of corn but he didn’t smile when he noticed her.

Seemingly ‘helping’ him was a young woman. She looked to be young, certainly no older than 20, and dressed in rather gaudy clothes. They were much like
Mamma’s dresses in their basic style but with far more ruffles and in a garish shade of cerise, with scarlet trim. Ruth paused to observe them and saw the woman put her hand on Sam’s arm quite often. He didn’t seem inclined to push her away either.

Ruth w
ondered if this was one of Miss Ellie’s girls; it wouldn’t surprise her in such an outfit.

“So, will you be at the
next barn dance?”

“Probably,” Sam answered. “I thought you didn’t like barn dances?”

“Well not all the time but they’re fun sometimes.”

‘Probably too busy working for Miss Ellie
most Saturdays,’
Ruth thought.

She
felt terrible a minute later when Mr Grant emerged from the store with another sack of flour. The girl immediately stopped behaving coquettishly and smiled at him.

“Hey Papa. I was just helping Mr Wakefield.”

“Well now your Mama needs help, Sally, the shop’s getting busy.” With a kiss on her father’s cheek, the girl disappeared inside with a final wave at Sam, who returned the gesture.

As the men chatted, Ruth wondered why she had judged the girl
, Sally, so harshly. Yes, her outfit was garish and her behaviour was forward but Ruth had basically labelled her as a prostitute! She despised such attitudes among her peers in England and now she was guilty of the same judgmental behaviour.

What was wrong with her?

Mr
Grant had gone back inside now and Sam spotted her, so she had no choice but to approach.

“You weren’t long,” he said reluctantly.

“I didn’t want to keep you waiting.”

Sam grunted and climbed up onto the cart.

“Where is Mamma?” Ruth asked, eager for her to ease the tension she felt being alone with Sam.

“She just went to the haberdashery.”

“But they had cloth in the general store?”

“General stores have a little of everything but not much choice
, although specialist shops are more expensive, so it depends on your needs, which you use.” It seemed to be taking all his energy to remain civil.

Ruth began to fume too. Couldn’t he see that she hadn’t wanted to go on a walk with
Mr Middleton? He hadn’t even asked how it went, just assumed that she had enjoyed it. Like he assumed that his decent treatment of her would encourage her to let him race Angel.

The man made an awful lot of assumptions and one of these days, it was going to bite him on the ass! She had heard that phrase in one of the hotels she had stayed in during her trip here
, and had thought it a very good saying.

They sat in awkward silence for a few minutes until
Mamma came around the corner, a wrapped parcel under her arm. Ruth offered her a hand up into the cart whilst Sam untethered the horses and they began the journey home.

“How was your walk with Mr Middleton?”

“Fine,” Ruth said unwilling to let Sam know that she hadn’t enjoyed it.

“Uh huh,”
Mamma replied in a knowing tone.

Ruth refrained from asking what she meant and
Mamma directed the conversation for the duration of the ride home.

***

“So,” Mamma asked as they were putting the groceries away, “What was your walk with Tobias really like?”

“He thinks himself a
gentleman without observing any of the proper form. I thought him rather obnoxious overall.”

“I knew you had good sense.”
Mamma smiled. “The man’s a blatherskite.”

“A what?” Ruth asked.

“An idiot who loves the sound of his own voice, a bit like a blowhard”

“
That one I know, and that’s Tobias all right,” Ruth agreed. “So why do he and Sam dislike each other so much?”

“Tobias think’s there’s
silver under this land, and wants Sam out so he can buy it.”

“
Silver?”

“
Silver is very popular these days. Not quite as glamorous as gold, I’ll grant, but a good money spinner if you can find it.”

“Is there
silver here?”

“I doubt it. I’ve lived here all my life, my mother and father had this ranch first, and I haven’t ever seen any sign of it.”

“So why does he believe it?”

Mamma
sighed. “Truth is that your husband tried to sell his share not long before he died. Now I can’t say for sure but I’d bet my boots that Ivor showed him some forged documents claiming it was true.”

“But he can’t force Sam
to sell, can he?”

“No, but he’s tried. See, Sam took out a small loan with Tobias about three years ago, Sam
wanted to expand so he needed to do the barn up and build a new one, plus he hoped to buy some racing breeding stock. He did well, bought good horses and they performed well but none of them were exceptional. He still had time to breed a good runner though. Then after your husband died, Tobias tried to call in the loan, hoping to foreclose on the ranch when Sam didn’t pay. Sam had to sell all his new stock to cover it. We’re no worse off than we were before, but we’re no better off either.”

“The ranch turns a profit though?”

“A little, yes, but not enough to expand.”

“Can’t you reinvest any profits?”

“Well we could have but Ivor wouldn’t hear of it, he needed the money too much. Sam’s half alone wasn’t enough and besides, he didn’t see why he should fund an expansion and see Ivor reap half the profits.”

“But we could do that now, couldn’t we? I have some savings and a small
legacy from my grandmother so if I continue living here, I won’t need to take any money out of the business.”

“You seem to know a lot about business,”
Mamma observed with a smile.

“I bought some books which I read on the boat.
” She blushed, as if ashamed of such an act. “I just wanted to know how businesses worked.”

“Well, seems to me you and Sam need to sit down and have a
little chat about things.”

Ruth didn’t look thrilled at the idea. “So is the ranch safe from Mr Middleton
now?”

“Safe as it can be, long as you don’t marry him.” She gave Ruth a pointed look.

“Ha! I can’t really see the point in marriage to be honest. I doubt I’ll ever marry again, especially someone like Mr Middleton.”

“What about having a family?”

“To be honest…” She blushed a deep shade of red and bowed her head. “I found marital relations to be downright painful and I honestly don’t understand why any woman would try it more than once. I only wonder that the human race still exists.”

Mamma
was frowning. “Can I ask, how many times did you have relations with Ivor?”

“Just the once. Afterwards he gave me a brandy that I think was drugged and when I woke up
almost a day later, he was gone.”

“He left on your wedding
day?”

Ruth nodded. “So as you can see, no man would want a wife like me, clearly I'm… not good at it.”

“Honey, you could be dead and a man could still enjoy himself with you. He didn’t leave because of you. If you ask me, I think he had it all planned out.”

“Planned out?”

“Why else would he have drugs on hand to ply you with? He always intended to run off and if you hadn’t been so pretty, he might have done so right after the wedding.”

Ruth was used to people asking what she had done to drive him away and after the wedding, there really was only one thing that she did, so she had assumed that she was bad at it.
Mamma’s thoughts seemed much more likely though; why would he bring drugs with him if he wasn’t planning to run away anyway?

“Still, I can’t see a reason to marry anyone else.”
Ruth sounded adamant.

“That’s your choi
ce, child, but never say never.” Mamma gave her a knowing smile but before Ruth could ask what she meant, Mamma continued. “Now, how about I take you for your first shooting lesson when we’ve done this?

“You’re going to teach me?” Ruth asked, feeling both relieved and a little disappointed that Sam wasn’t teaching her.

“Sam asked me to yesterday. Didn’t he say?”

“No,” Ruth said darkly, silently adding,
‘There’s an awful lot that your son doesn’t say.’

***

The Wakefields had a standing tradition that every six weeks, one family would host the others for Sunday lunch. The first get together was Ruth’s first weekend here, so she was excused but today was Mamma’s turn to host, so Ruth couldn’t avoid it. Still, she had met all four daughters as well as most of the husbands and children at the barn dance, so she didn’t feel nearly so intimidated.

The eldest daughter was
Melissa, who was married to Al and had eight children; Charles, Beth, William, Andrew, John, Peggy, James and Daniel. Jinny was the second oldest daughter and married a blacksmith named Clyde; together they only had one child, Cindy. Ruth didn’t like to ask why but she wondered if Jinny found marital relations as distasteful as she had.

At 27,
Lucy was five years younger than Sam and she had married Jack, with whom she’d had two sons with, Henry and baby Jake. The youngest daughter, Beatrice or Bea, had only been married to Nathan for a year but her first child was on the way.

Having 18
for dinner, or 21 if she included herself, Mamma and Sam, wasn’t unusual for Ruth but catering to 21 certainly was! Despite Mamma having Cassy’s help, Ruth felt compelled to assist with the preparations for the meal and she had never cut, chopped and peeled so many vegetables in her life. The onions made her cry, the potatoes seemed endless and she cut herself on more than one occasion.

Whilst
her muscles felt better today, the thumb and index finger of her right hand were feeling the effect of her shooting practice yesterday, so she was even less dexterous with a paring knife than usual.

Still it was better than poor
Mamma, who was plucking, gutting and stuffing the turkeys she’d bought in town yesterday; and Cassy, who was making some kind of stock from the birds’ internal organs.

“Damn it!” Ruth cried as she sliced her finger
again. She reached for the, by now well used dish-towel and held it to her finger until it stopped bleeding.

“Having trouble?”

She turned to see Sam looking amused at her distress.

“Why does my pain seem to amuse you?”

He frowned but didn’t answer.

“Rather than just standing there, why don’t you lend a hand?” Ruth demanded.

“Oh no, the kitchen is a woman’s domain.”

“And the ranch is a man’s. Doesn’t seem to have stopped me.”

She shoved the handle of her paring knife at him and when he gripped it, she got up from the table and stalked off to the water pump to wash her hands, now that the bleeding had stopped. She didn’t expect him to actually help, so she was surprised to return and find him sitting opposite, peeling a potato.

Rather than commenting, she grabbed another knife and got back to work. They worked in silence for a while, listening to
Mamma and Cassy chatting in the background, until Sam let out a yelp and stuck his thumb in his mouth. The trickle of blood on his knife gave away what had happened.

“Not as funny when it’s your finger, is it?” Ruth asked unable to keep a smile from her lips.

“Point taken,” he said with a graceful smile.

“Wash your hands before you start again!”
Mamma called. Little escaped her notice in her kitchen.

The birds had long been in the oven
(slow cooking, Cassy said) by the time Ruth and Sam were finished. Mamma cut the potatoes up, put them in a huge roasting tin with some of the onion and what looked like a pound of butter, then slipped it in the oven, below one of the turkeys. Ruth was just amazed that everything fit into the stove at once. The stock was simmering on the top of the stove whilst the other vegetables would be boiled later or added to the potato pan to roast. Many loaves of cornbread, as well as shortcake for dessert had already been cooked the day before.

With the kitchen work done, Ruth helped Sam set up a trellis table in the dining room for all the extra guests.

The family began arriving at around noon and there were so many of them, they were spread throughout the ground floor, talking in small groups, with the younger children running around outside.

The
meal was served at around two o’clock in the afternoon and food was served on large platters or in bowls, which everyone helped themselves to and then passed around.

Sam watched as Ruth talked with his family, seemingly at ease with them in a way she wasn’t with him.
He wished he knew what to do or say to make her trust him.

After the meal, he watched as John approached Ruth and after a whispered conversation, he took her hand and they left the house heading towards the barns. When they didn’t return for almost half an hour, Sam decided to seek them out, wondering what they were doing. Not that he thought his seven year old nephew or Ruth were up to anything nefarious
, but his curiosity was piqued.

He found them in the first barn and realised that John was
teaching her some of the dances from the barn dance, counting along the beats in the absence of music. He poked his head around the door to watch and marvelled at how happy Ruth seemed. She was smiling and laughing as they danced between the stalls.

The dances were slightly awkward given their discrepancies in height but they were making do. John didn’t know many of the ladies
’ steps but Ruth was doing a pretty good job of guessing, by mirroring him.

“Can you play an instrument?” he heard John ask.
Ruth didn’t seem to need the beat count any longer.

“I play
the piano,” she answered.

“Are you any good?”

“I think so. Reasonable, at least.” She smiled at him as he twirled her under his arm.

“
Can you play anything else?”

“No, only the piano.”

“It’s a shame pianos are so heavy, we could do with some better musicians at these things.”

“Why don’t you learn to play an instrument?” Ruth asked.

“I’m learning to play the fiddle but I’m not very good yet.”