Under a Texas Star (3 page)

The bed, like many old spring beds, sagged in the middle. Once they were no longer capable of consciously keeping to their sides, they met in the middle. Instinctively, they took advantage of each other's body heat as the night grew colder. It wasn't the first time Jase had shared his bed with a fellow traveler and ended up back to back, sharing warmth.

He woke the next morning with his arm about Marly. The boy's head was on his shoulder and one hand rested on his chest near his heart. It felt so comfortable that it might have worried him
―if he had not just discovered that Marly Landers was a girl.

Chapter 3

Marly woke up in easy stages.

At some point, in what seemed to be a dream, she felt warm and safe in a secure embrace―a feeling she had not known since her mother had died.

Later, sh
e stirred. Feeling a slight draft, she pulled the covers in closer and snuggled back down into sleep. Whether it was a minute or an hour later, she didn't know. Finally, sleep gave over to wakefulness.

She pulled herself up on her elbow. "Morning."

Already awake and dressed, Jase straddled a chair and watched her. "C'mon, sleepy head," he said with an exaggerated drawl. "We got miles to go. You get yourself cleaned up and dressed. And be quick. I'm going down for coffee and I'll be ordering breakfast. If you're late, you'll get yours cold."

After he left, Marly took advantage of the privacy to have a sponge bath. It had almost broken her heart not to take a bath the day before, but she couldn't very well use the men's room at a public bathhouse.

As she stripped down, she wished she had the nerve to ask Jase for a new set of long underwear. She made do, beating out the dust and using a damp towel to attack the worst of the dirt. She did the same with the singlet she wore underneath, a hand-knit garment she'd been given half a lifetime ago when she was ten. Being knit, it stretched to fit her and held in parts that would otherwise have given away her masquerade.

"And to think," she said, examining her modest curves, "at one time I wished I had a real figure."

Aside from feeling safer, she rather enjoyed being a boy, instead of the young lady her aunt always expected her to be. More importantly, a boy could travel alone, though she was glad of Jase's company and protection.

Of course, if she had been born a boy, she wouldn't be in this trouble in the first place. If she had been born a boy, she might have been able to protect her mother and wouldn't have needed to protect herself. If she had failed to save her mother, a boy could have stayed with Sarge, instead of being taken to her aunt for propriety's sake. And if she had been taken to her aunt, a boy wouldn't be expected to help out at the school. He might have been allowed to work for the Sheriff instead. More importantly, a boy wouldn't have been seduced by a honey-talking, city slicker whose good looks and charm were in direct proportion to his criminal motives.

So far, the masquerade hadn't been overtaxing. One of the benefits of overseeing the schoolyard was that she knew first-hand how boys acted. She modeled her behavior after young John Henry who, with three older brothers to train him, knew how to get away with murder around adults and hold his own with the bigger boys like John Thomas.

Soon, being boyish came naturally to her. She didn't have to act like someone else. Her deception was aided by the fact that no one expected a young woman to be travelling on her own dressed as a boy. She suspected that one or two women she'd met had seen through the disguise. Since they didn't say anything, she couldn't be sure. The important thing was that no man would see her as a woman and take advantage of her.

Marly didn't really think Jase Strachan would do that. She almost trusted him.

But then she had trusted that hazel-eyed snake, Charlie, too.

She remained cautious. Even if he didn't hurt her, Jase would probably feel it his duty to send her back to Aunt Adele.

She couldn't let that happen.

I reckon, she thought as she scrubbed her face, if I can pass for a boy sleeping back-to-back in the same bed, I probably don't have much to worry about.

After Marly took care of her ablutions, Jase purchased extra supplies. Flour, sugar, coffee, beans and bacon were distributed between their saddlebags. Marly's bags also carried chocolate, dried fruit and peanuts. Jase's carried extra ammunition.

She hoped they wouldn't have to use the latter.

"My man has at least four days on us now," he announced as they rode out of town. "I know he's headed for El Paso, so I'm gonna risk headin' there directly, instead of trailin' him from town to town."

"He's on the stage?"

"Good guess," he acknowledged with a nod of his head. "He's not the ridin' type. He's been travellin' the stage, stoppin' now and then to play poker and relieve more suckers of their cash."

"And that's why you are hunting him?"

Marly's skepticism was met with a derisive snort.

"If he cheats at the table, sooner or later it'll catch up with him. No, I'm on his trail for a more ambitious crime. He embezzled money from the wrong people. The kind who take this sort of thing personally and have the contacts in the Governor's house to back up their vendettas."

"So you're after the money he stole."

"He doesn't have the money with him. We caught him once and he gave us the slip. Lost him for a bit after that, then I got a tip that he was headed for El Paso."

"How do you know he doesn't have the money now?"

"I don't," he admitted with a shrug. "I'm guessin' because he's livin' hand to mouth. Game to game, in his case."

They stopped mid-afternoon to make camp.

"I'm not tired yet," she said.

"We don't have a waiter to bring us dinner tonight. Or a readymade bed. We can't just ride 'til you're falling out of your saddle."

Marly was about to protest. Hadn't she travelled a hundred miles on her own, often walking for long stretches of the day? It was true. She didn't have Jase's stamina in the saddle, but...

She bit back a retort that was at the tip of her tongue. She had only a commonsense notion of how to make camp.

Swallowing her pride, she listened to Jase and did as she was told. She committed every step to memory, from tending and hobbling the horses to clearing the area and digging a fire pit. Jase had found a slight hollow with scrub providing additional shelter. The horses were kept within sight, out in the open where they could graze on prairie grass.

"Know how to handle a revolver?" Jase asked once they were settled.

She eyed him with suspicion. "I know enough not to shoot my foot off."

Jase had two revolvers. A Colt Peacemaker, which he wore in his holster, and a Colt Navy, a relic of the war. He put aside the Navy and had Marly start with the lighter weight Peacemaker. He unloaded the gun and took it apart, explaining the various parts and their functions with the bored ease of a teacher repeating the most basic lessons.

She got the impression that Jase had been an instructor and a soldier in his past. Under his tutelage, she reassembled, loaded, unloaded, and disassembled the Peacemaker. The third time she loaded the gun, he stopped her, took the gun back and checked it over.

"Okay," he said, picking up the second gun and his rifle. "Let's see what you can do."

She followed him to a place where deadwood created a natural wall. Using large stones, he set up six targets. Then he counted off fifteen paces and signaled her to stand beside him.

He handed her the Peacemaker. "Point and shoot."

Marly reluctantly took the gun and checked it before straight-arming the revolver in front of her and pulling the trigger. The gun wobbled and a clump of dirt flew up several feet in front of the target area.

Jase stepped up behind her and reached around her waist. "Steady the gun with your other hand."

As he posed her arms, his hard muscles pressed into her back.

Torn between fear and excitement, Marly stiffened.

"Relax," he whispered. "Take your time. Speed will come. Squeeze, don't pull." He backed away and cleared his throat. "And try aiming. It helps."

With great concentration, she aimed the gun, instead of merely pointing it. The shot went over the targeted stone.

"Better. Watch me."

Marly handed over the gun with relief.

"Now draw a bead on your target. Stare that pebble in the eye and shoot it before it shoots you." He demonstrated, picking off the next target. Then he spun the Peacemaker and handed it back, grip first. "Try it. Think of it as somethin' that can shoot back."

With a fatalistic shrug, she accepted the gun and followed his instructions. The stone exploded into dust. She looked at Jase in surprise and received an 'I-told-you-so' expression in response.

"Again," he ordered.

She hit the next target, but not dead-on. It ricocheted off the log.

"Again."

She missed.

"Don't try so hard. Just do it."

Click.

"Don't to forget to count your shots," he said, setting up more targets. "You have to reload first."

Marly reloaded the gun. She hit four out of six targets, missing one and nicking the other.

"You got a good eye," Jase said. "Let's try another round, then we'll go on to the rifle."

Hitting five out of six, she smiled with satisfaction.

In a flash of blue steel, Jase drew the Navy and shot the remaining target. With a showy spin, he returned the gun to his holster.

Marly stared in awe. Returning to the business of reloading, she handed the Peacemaker back to Jase. He checked and holstered it, tucking the gun into the small of his back.

He handed her the Winchester .44 carbine. They hunted around for more targets and set them up. He counted off twenty-five paces this time, explaining that the rifle had a greater range and accuracy than the handgun.

"Ready?"

Marly took a deep breath. One. Two.

The stones exploded in quick succession.

She backed up five more paces. Three. Four. Five.

Not one miss. All hits were dead-on.

She gave him a smug grin. He acknowledged it with a raised eyebrow. Without warning, he threw two pieces of wood into the air. Marly swung the rifle up and both pieces of wood were hit, square on. Jase let out a whistle of admiration.

"My Aunt Adele," Marly explained, expertly topping up the Winchester's magazine, then cradling the rifle in her arms. "She thought that riding horses was a waste of resources and sidearms were only respectable when carried by an officer of the law. Even then, she wasn't too sure about them. But I can hitch and drive a pair, and she made sure I learned to hit what I was aiming at with a shotgun or a rifle."

Jase grinned. "Jack rabbits mostly, I expect."

"And wolves. I have to admit, I didn't aim for the animals, just the earth beneath them. I figured they could warn their kin off if they lived to tell about their near miss. Anyway, the way I see it, long as there are rabbits, the wolves will eat them. And long as there are wolves, the rabbits won't overrun the garden." She shrugged. "Still, Aunt Adele was convinced I was a lousy shot."

"What else did she teach you?"

"She's a school teacher, so she taught me reading, writing and arithmetic. She also taught me how to cook, mend, chop wood, build a fire, tend chickens, hoe, mow, fear God and mind my manners."

"Why'd you leave?"

"She told me to."

It was close enough to the truth, though Aunt Adele had another destination in mind.

"I suppose," she said, bitterness in her voice, "I didn't learn some lessons as well as I did others."

That killed the conversation for a few minutes. Marly was pensive and she was thankful that Jase was too cautious to ask the kind of questions that might prompt her to reveal her secret.

How long could she keep it from him anyway?

It was only a matter of time before he found out she was a girl.

Jase put her to work cleaning the guns and rifle as he cooked. It was not the most inspiring fare
―beans and biscuits―but the coffee was good.

"Who taught you what you know?" she asked when Jase showed her how to clean dishes without water, using the sandy earth instead.

"I got a little schooling when I was a youngster. I learned to read and write and
do my numbers. Then my pa was killed. I had to stay home and work the farm with my ma and help take care of my little sister. In the evening, I'd read to ma. She liked to hear stories and she wanted me to keep in practice."

"Sounds nice."

"It wasn't a bad life, I guess. Can't say I ever took to farming. At sixteen, I joined the Rangers."

"Your sister?"

"Dead. All the family I know of is dead or gone."

There was a long silence.

Jase finally broke the mood by launching into a lecture on how to pack the gear in the saddlebags so it took up the least amount of space and the weight was evenly distributed. By the light of the fire, he had her unpack and pack her saddlebags to prove she'd been listening. While she packed, he started a second pot of coffee.

"I generally sleep light on the trail. Since there's two of us, we might as well take turns sleepin'. You take the first watch. Just sit comfortable and keep the fire low. Don't stare into the flames. It's a sure way to get sleepy and it'll ruin your night vision. When the moon is high, wake me. I'll take over. Coffee will be ready soon. It'll help keep you awake."

"Are we likely to get attacked?"