Wicked Wyoming Nights (29 page)

Iris stumbled in wearing a night cap and a voluminous flannel nightgown under a thick housecoat. “What on earth is going on? Why are you getting dressed at three in the morning?”

“Mr. Stedman has had her uncle locked up for stealing one of his cows. The man’s raving like a lunatic, and Miss Eliza’s got to go down there and make some sense out of all that gibberish.” Lucy’s story was beginning to grow with each telling.

“Give me a minute and I’ll come with you.”

“Maybe you’d better not,” Eliza said apologetically. “Uncle says some pretty terrible things when he’s mad. When he calms down, he’s angry at everyone who heard him.”

“I never got out of bed,” said Iris with a crooked grin. “Be sure to let me know if I can do anything to help.”

“Where is Mr. Blaine? Can’t he talk to Uncle?”

“Nobody has seen him,” Lucy related. “Though I’d like to know what he’s doing out of his bed in the middle of the night.”

“Don’t worry about that now. Just send him to the sheriff’s office the minute you find him. I’m sure it’s all a ridiculous misunderstanding, but I need Mr. Blaine. Uncle Ira never listens to anything I say.”

The scene that greeted Eliza’s eyes outstripped even her worse fears. The Buffalo city jail had to serve the whole of Johnson County, but it was a rudimentary affair with no separate area for the cells, and Ira was locked up only a few feet from the sheriff’s desk. He had an unobstructed view of his hated protagonist and was screaming profanities at Cord and ignoring the sheriff’s orders to be quiet so he could get down what Mr. Stedman was saying. Cord, accompanied by Royce and Sturgis, was answering the sheriff’s questions with a steely calm that immediately made Eliza uneasy.

Still followed by Lucy, Eliza came to a halt in the middle of the room, uncertain of whom to turn to first, the sheriff, Ira, or her beloved Cord.

“Sorry to get you out of bed like this, Miss Smallwood,” Sheriff Joe Hooker said, rising from his chair, “but I’m mighty glad you came.” He was a likeable young man, only on the job a little over six months, but he was too young and inexperienced to understand the crosscurrents threatening the peace of Johnson County.

“Why has my uncle been arrested?” Eliza asked, turning to Cord. Sheriff Hooker hurriedly set out a chair which Eliza ignored.

“Mr. Stedman and his boys say they caught your uncle trying to make off with one of his steers. Your uncle says it isn’t so, but I can’t make head or tail of what he says he was intending to do with that beef.”

“If he says he’s innocent then why is he locked up?”

“Mainly ‘cause I can’t keep him from jumping Mr. Stedman any other way.”

Is that any reason to put an innocent man in jail?” demanded Eliza.

“Yes, miss, it is. It’s my responsibility to protect the citizens as well as their property, and your uncle is not willing to leave Mr. Stedman alone.”

“My uncle would never steal from anybody,” Eliza insisted, turning quickly filling eyes to Cord’s hard gaze. “There must be some other explanation.”

“He may not steal from anybody else, ma’am, but he sure had his rope on Matador meat this time,” Sturgis stated, nettled.

“I saw him myself, Eliza. There was no mistaking what he was doing.” There was an implacable quality in Cord’s voice Eliza had never heard before. She stared at him, unable to understand the change.

“There must be another answer,” Eliza maintained. “Please, Uncle Ira, tell them what you were really doing.”

“I’m not saying a word to that sneaking son of a bitch,” her uncle blared. “And the sheriff is nothing but his pawn.”

“I’ve told you that kind of talk will do you no good, Mr. Smallwood.”

“And I’ve told you I’ve got nothing to say until my partner shows up. He’s more interested in my welfare than my own flesh and blood.”

“That’s not true,” said Eliza “Does that mean you’re not going to marry that villain?”

“No, but-”

“Then you’re wasting your breath talking to me. You might as well desecrate your Aunt Sarah’s grave as marry that devil.” Ira turned his back on Eliza and sat down on the bunk in the cell area.

“He’s still angry about our engagement,” Eliza said to Cord. “He’ll get over it if you just give him some more time.”

“I’ll give him all the time in the world to learn to tolerate me”—Cord was still cold and unbending—“but that doesn’t include letting him help himself to my cattle.”

“But he wasn’t stealing your cattle.”

“Then maybe you can tell me why he had his rope on a steer and was leading him off my land?”

“I don’t know, but I know he wasn’t trying to steal it. He’s never taken anything in his whole life that wasn’t his.”

“All I’m asking for is an explanation. I asked for one when I caught him and the sheriff’s been after the same thing for the last hour, but he won’t talk.”

“I’ll never talk to you, you Judas.”

“Uncle, don’t,” begged Eliza. “Please,” she said, turning once more to Cord, “let him go, for my sake. He won’t bother your herds again. I promise.”

“Don’t you go making promises in my name because you can’t deliver them,” said Ira.

But Eliza’s attention was on Cord, tensely awaiting his answer. This wasn’t the same man who had held her in his arms, igniting fires of love in her mind and body, loving her until she felt disembodied. Something had happened to Cord; she didn’t know this man.

“I can’t drop the charges until I have an explanation I can believe,” Cord said with wintry severity, “To let him go now would be an open invitation to every rustler in the county to help himself.”

“We should have given him a warning instead of wasting time coming here,” muttered Royce, who found the whole proceeding tedious and unproductive.

“Shut up, you fool,” Sturgis hissed in his ear. “You can’t expect a man to beat his fiancé’s uncle senseless and then show up in her parlor asking her to marry him.” Since neither boy knew how to talk in a voice quiet enough to be considered a whisper anywhere except on the open prairie, their exchange was heard by everyone in the room with widely different reactions: Cord with icy stiffness, Ira with a hot rage, Eliza with shocked indignation, and Sheriff Hooker with plain curiosity.

“Miss Smallwood, am I to understand that you and Mr. Stedman are engaged to be married?” Sheriff Hooker asked.

“No, they’re not,” Ira bellowed from his cell.

“Miss Smallwood has agreed to become my wife,” Cord said very formally, “but knowing her uncle’s opposition, we decided to withhold the announcement until she had had a chance to talk with him.”

“I forbid it,” shouted Ira. “I’ll stop it even if I have to take her to St. Louis.”

A welcome interruption occurred with the entrance of Croley Blaine. Cord wasn’t the only one to notice Blaine’s clothes were more than ordinarily dusty and that he was breathing too hard to have come from anyplace in town.

“What’s going on here, Joe? Iris tells me you’ve arrested Ira.”

“Mr. Stedman and his boys brought him in about an hour ago and swore out a complaint. His niece insists he’s innocent, but Ira just sits there calling Mr. Stedman names and being as uncooperative as a grizzled lobo.”

“If Ira was caught with a rope on one of Cord’s steers, he did it to get back at Mr. Stedman,” Croley said, crossing over to the cell and looking at Ira rawer than the others. “He didn’t take the news of his niece’s engagement very well.”

“That won’t wash,” Sturgis stated in a flat denial. “I don’t know how he felt about Miss Smallwood’s engagement, but there’s been some shady business going on on our range lately and he was there as a cover.”

“Are you accusing my uncle of being involved with a gang?” asked Eliza, incredulous.

“I don’t know what he’s involved with, Miss Smallwood, but he wasn’t out there taking one steer in a fit of anger. We’ve got cows wandering around bawling for their lost calves, and it ain’t wolves that took them this time.”

“Cord, are you going to let that man talk about my uncle like this?”

“Something is going on, and at least this time your uncle acted as a front. When we caught up with him, he started shouting and shooting his gun—”

“I was shooting at you, you coyote.”

“—and did his best to delay us. He didn’t even try to escape.”

“Of course he didn’t,” Croley said, “because he was angry. I’ve been Ira’s partner for nearly six months now, Joe, as long as you’ve been sheriff, and I can vouch for it he has a hasty temper. He has a particular grudge against Mr. Stedman for throwing him off a piece of property on Bear Creek and for showing an interest in his niece.”

“That’s true.” Eliza turned from Cord to the sheriff. “Anyone who comes to the saloon can tell you that.”

“Let him go, Sheriff, and I’ll stand surety he won’t bother Mr. Stedman’s herd again.”

“I intend to let him go, but I can’t stop his trial unless Mr. Stedman drops the charges.”

“You will drop the charges, won’t you?” Eliza said, turning hopefully toward Cord. “He wasn’t really trying to steal anything. Tell him you weren’t, Uncle Ira,” Eliza pleaded, whipping around to face her uncle.

For a moment it looked as though Ira was going to have another outburst, but under the steely gaze of his partner, his eyes dropped to the floor. “Yeah, I was only doing it to aggravate you.” He lifted his head, his eyes blazing, and pointed a shaking finger at Cord. “But I’ll never let you marry Eliza.”

“See, I told you. Now will you drop the charges?” Eliza implored.

Cord stood facing Eliza, his eyes staring at something beyond her.

“Cord,” Eliza entreated, unable to believe he would not immediately free her uncle, “tell the sheriff you’ll drop the charges.”

His gaze refocused on Eliza. “But I’m not going to.” He said the words in a quiet voice Eliza had never heard before, but one his men had experienced often enough to know Cord’s mind was made up.

Eliza staggered as though struck a physical blow. “But you heard him say he was only doing it to get back at you. You can’t mean to bring him to trial in front of the whole town.”

“That’s exactly what I intend to do. He’s lying and we caught him red-handed. This is the best chance I’ve had to get a conviction in three years.

“Don’t you love me enough to forgive him for my sake?”

“It’s not a question of my love. I can’t back down now, as much for the other ranchers as for myself. There’s a ring of rustlers operating out there, a gang intent upon stealing whole herds instead of single steers, and if the only way to get to the heart of it is by cutting off the arms one at a time, that’s what I’ll do.”

“Then you really mean to humiliate him in front of the whole town?” Eliza inquired, stunned. “It’s my uncle your trying to convict. Have you stopped to consider what this will do to me?” Eliza demanded, growing angry.

“I still say we should have busted him up. Then there wouldn’t have been any of this trial business,” Royce whispered. Sturgis stomped on his toe, hard, with the heel of his boot.

“You know I wouldn’t do this if I could help it,” said Cord. “The last thing I want is to hurt you.”

“Then have my uncle released,” Eliza snapped.

“I can’t. The sheriff has already set the day for his hearing.”

“Isn’t that awfully fast, Joe?” Croley asked.

“It can’t be helped. The judge will be in town next week, and if he doesn’t stand his trial now, it’ll be another six months before he gets his chance. You don’t want this hanging over his head all that time, do you?”

“No I don’t,” Eliza stated emphatically. “I want him tried as soon as possible so his innocence can be proved once and for all.”

“He ain’t innocent, lady” Royce protested, unable to keep quiet during what in his eyes was a miscarriage of justice. “He had his rope around that calf’s neck.”

Eliza’s indignant gaze didn’t flicker for one instant from Cord’s face. “I never thought you’d let a foolish misunderstanding blind you to all fairness. I’ve spent months trying to get Uncle to stop talking against you. Mr. Blaine even promised to do what he could, but you won’t do the same with your hirelings.”

“I don’t hide behind my boys,” Cord responded, his eyes hooded and his face impassive. “I lodged this complaint.”

“Then why won’t you withdraw it?” asked Eliza, deeply hurt and completely bewildered. “I even threatened to sing for the competition if he didn’t stop talking against you. Can’t you do as much for me?”

“That has nothing to do with you or me. It’s about gangs and rustling.”

“But nobody believes Uncle Ira was trying to rustle your cows, by himself or as part of a gang.”

“I do. If you can have so much faith in your uncle, why can’t you have a little in me?”

Eliza’s heart lurched at the bleakness of his voice and her anger faded. “Whatever Uncle may have been doing, I
know
he wasn’t trying to steal. I never thought you would accuse him unfairly, only that there was some sort of misunderstanding.”

“And if I still say I’m not wrong?”

“You must be,” Eliza insisted, feeling Cord slipping away from her. Why was everything going wrong? Why didn’t someone do something to stop it?