Wed to the Montana Cowboy Page 21

  Smothers stared him down and he stared back. One of them would be dead before nightfall and they both knew it.

  Johnson, being pushed from behind by a gust, appeared in the clearing carrying a pair of rabbits. One shot, two rabbits? The man must be as deadly a shot as his reputation said.

  “Been sitting here, just like you said to,” Smothers declared. “Couldn’t say it was comfortable though, being left here without my weapon in the company of a known killer.”

  “Ain’t nothin’ going to be known until after the trial.” Johnson turned his back and set the rabbits on a flat rock. Squatting, he took out his knife to begin the butchering. “Can’t say this man here is any more guilty of a crime than you are until the judge and jury have their say.”

  Johnson had set his shotgun aside to gut the rabbits. Smothers shot it a swift, sidelong glance.

  As quick as a viper, Smothers ran across the clearing and snatched it up.

  Lantree shouted.

  Johnson spun about, flung the butcher knife, dripping red with rabbit blood, and impaled Smothers in the neck.

  He fell face-first, his arms twitching.

  “Unlock my hands!” Lantree shouted at the cursing lawman. “Before he bleeds to death.”

  “Got my piece on you,” Johnson said, but he hurried to unlock the cuffs.

  Lantree turned Smothers over, careful to keep the knife from shifting and doing more harm than had already been done.

  “Mortal wound,” Johnson pronounced, gazing down over his shoulder. “Seen my share of those.”

  And delivered his fair share, as well, so the stories went.

  “Put some pressure here, beside the knife,” Lantree said.

  He couldn’t make sense of why he was trying to save this man’s life since Johnson was probably right about it being a mortal wound. And there was no reason he should want Smothers to live except that he had taken an oath.

  An oath that he had ignored for a very long time.

  While the sheriff applied pressure, Lantree carefully removed the blade. Even if Smothers did survive the cut, he doubted the man’s heart could take the stress of the loss of blood.

  Pressing his fingers to the mayor’s neck, he felt for a pulse.

  “It’s weak, but keep on pressing like you are and see if he stabilizes.”

  “Can’t figure why you’d want him to. Seems to me he was out to do you harm.”

  “There is that part of me that would be relieved to see him die. But hell and damn, man, I’m a doctor. I’ve had my fill of watching folks die.”

  “Fill or not, this one’s got the color of death on him. You’re wasting your time, Walker.”

  He nodded because he knew it to be true, but...

  The pulse under his fingertips stuttered, stopped.

  With a nod he sat back and gripped his thighs.

  Johnson stared at him for a long time. Weighing his fate in the balance, no doubt.

  “You’re free to go, Dr. Walker.” Johnson extended a handshake. “Your brother’s still as wanted as ever, even though I might believe you about the shooting being unintended.”

  “I’ll need a horse. Smothers hired men to attack my family. Said they were at the ranch now.”

  He needed to be home. Even a fast ride might not be enough to get him to Moreland Ranch in time.

  “Let’s go,” Johnson said, setting off into the woods at a run.

  * * *

  “I’ve got to say, cousin, you do look frightening.”

  “Repulsive...and wonderful all rolled into one.” Melinda fluffed the horror on her head, preening.

  Rebecca reached out to touch one of the dozen snakes that she had weaved into Melinda’s hair then secured into a wicked halo with wire.

  “What ghoulish piece will you play?”

  “I expect that Chopin’s funeral march ought to send them running for home.”

  “It might send me running for home.”

  Even though the wind had begun to settle, hefty gusts still came out of nowhere to shake the trees and brush.

  Melinda walked close beside Rebecca, listening for angry shouts or gunfire.

  In the end it was seeing a treetop toppling in the distance that showed them where they needed to be.

  Luckily, the distance was not far, not even a mile. Looking down from the top of a hill, they saw several trees littering the ground.

  Melinda gripped her arm and eased down to kneel behind the fallen trunk. She laid her crutch in the dirt beside her.

  Less than a hundred yards down the embankment men had lit a campfire for the evening. The conversation was loud and the jokes not meant for feminine ears.

  “With all the noise they’re making, I don’t think they care if they get caught,” Melinda whispered. “In my opinion this whole tree-napping is not for wood. It’s a trap, Becca, and it’s you they want. Doesn’t it seem an odd coincidence that your husband was carted off at the same time the tree cutting started? That Smothers fellow wanted him away from here.”

  It did make sense. No genuine tree-napper would cut so close to the house.

  “If it is me they want, they know what bait to use. Look over there a ways... It’s Grandfather, Jeeter and Tom all sitting on a log.”

  “Tied up.” Melinda squinted her eyes. “Oh, and look! They’re making Barstow cook...something. What is it, do you think?”

  She shook her head. Barstow disdained cooking outside over an open flame. “Whatever it is, it’s going to taste like mud.”

  “How many men do you see?” Melinda asked.

  The light was growing dim and the figures were moving so it was hard to tell.

  “Four,” she said at last. “No...no, it’s five.”

  “Five men against the ghost of Catherine Moreland?” Melinda shrugged and arched one brow. “I’d feel sorry for them if they weren’t such greedy perverts.”

  “How is your leg? I’m sure you’ve walked too long on it.”

  “A twinge now and again, but really, it’s fine... Oh, no!”

  “‘Oh, no’? What?”

  “Two more men have come and they are pointing weapons at our men.”

  “Mike and Dimwit, unless I miss my guess.” The light was growing dim but she was sure it was them.

  “You rarely do... Becca, do you think we should go home?”

  “You know I won’t leave Grandfather a prisoner, especially if I’m the one they are waiting for. Now with Mike here, I’m sure you’re right about this whole situation.”

  “You know what I think, Becca?”

  “What?”

  “It’s not just the two of us behind this log... I think Catherine Rose is here, too.”

  That was a comfort. While they might frighten the wits out of the men below with Grandmother’s ghost, she was greatly relieved to have her spirit accompanying them.

  “We’ll wait a few more minutes, until it’s full dark and the moon begins to rise.”

  “And until they eat whatever vile feast Barstow has prepared. If he hasn’t put something in it to make them vomit, I’ll be astonished.”

  “You said something once, and you were right, Melinda. It was when you said that if you stayed in Kansas City you would be stifled... I’m so glad you came.”

  “Maybe one day I’ll find my daydream man, just like you did.”

  All of a sudden her heart ached. Where was Lantree? Was he safe? The sooner this mess below was straightened out, the sooner they could gather the neighbors and bring him home.

  “There it is,” Rebecca announced when the moon, a big fat yellow ball, cleared the horizon.

  “Time to bring our men home.”

  Rebecca removed her violin from its case then began to descend the hill.


  “Whatever you do,” she told Melinda, “stay away from Mike, the fat one with the big nose. He’s trouble in the worst way and he won’t be afraid of Catherine Rose.”

  “What’s this slop?” a man bellowed from below. “It tastes like—”

  All of a sudden the fellow covered his mouth and dashed into the woods.

  “By George, what did he expect?”

  Rebecca looked at her cousin and instead found herself staring into the eye of a dead snake, but it didn’t look dead because moonlight shone on its empty eye socket.

  Even she was unnerved by the sight.

  When they had snuck within fifty feet of the campfire, they hid behind a dense bush.

  “I’ll play for thirty seconds and then you rise from the foliage. When we’ve caught their attention we’ll quit for a time then reappear over there.”

  Rebecca drew the bow across the strings of her violin. The mournful melody suffused the campsite. The hair rose on her arms when what could only be described as a warm breath caressed her fingers.

  Through a thin spot in the foliage, she saw her grandfather lift his head and glance about. He nudged Jeeter in the side with his elbow. Jeeter poked Tom.

  Melinda rose from the weeds, lifted her arms and swayed.

  “It’s her!” Dimwit screeched. “Ain’t no amount of money Smothers can pay me to make it worth annoying a banshee. Let her keep her trees. I’m heading for home.”

  Melinda slowly glided back into the bush.

  “You yellow-bellied coward!” Mike shouted at Dimwit’s retreating figure. “I’ll shoot you where you stand.”

  This set-to gave her and Melinda the cover they needed to track to the other side of the camp and crouch behind a fallen log. The cuts from the axes left gouges in the wood. Sap oozed from the wounds, filling the air with the scent of resin.

  An odd sensation tingled her fingertips...irritation, she was sure of it. What could this be but Catherine Rose expressing her anger over her trees?

  By George, it did not seem logical or sane, but there it was nonetheless.

  “Two of them are gone,” Rebecca said. “Only five more, but one of them is Mike.”

  “Strike up those strings, Becca.”

  The funeral march settled over the campsite, dark, oppressive and echoing among the trees so that it was difficult for the criminals to know exactly were it came from...until Medusa rose up behind them and screeched.

  They hadn’t discussed the screech, but it sent two more men running for the woods.

  Melinda dragged her crutch behind her as they took the moment of confusion to duck behind a large shrub twenty feet away from Grandfather, Jeeter and Tom.

  Barstow also took that moment to free Grandfather.

  Once again, Mr. Chopin’s morbid tune sent two more men into the dark woods. A wildcat’s cry cut the night but the threat didn’t send any of the men back to camp.

  By the saints, they would not be back, and that left only Mike. Mike and his gun, which he had shoved against Grandfather’s ribs.

  Jeeter shouted profanity...then Tom shouted it louder. Barstow lifted a kettle of boiling water but set it down again, probably realizing that if he tossed it on Mike, it would burn Grandfather, as well.

  “I know you ain’t no spook, lady. Get on out here before I plug the old man.”

  * * *

  Hell and damn! Lantree had held out a slight hope that Rebecca had remained safely at home. Until he’d heard the dirge, beautifully played, but a dirge nonetheless.

  The hair-raising screech that followed had been Melinda’s.

  He’d raced the horse past a man vomiting in the bushes then another fleeing in white-faced fear.

  Johnson had stopped a short distance back to arrest the first man they came across crashing through the brush. Lantree thought it was Dimwit, but didn’t slow enough to find out for sure.

  When he hit the rise of the hill, he went cold to the bone. The scene below was dire, shattering.

  The full moon cast long blowing shadows of trees across the ground. The campfire’s snapping flames were seven feet tall and made the faces within its glow look demonic.

  One face needed no help with that. Snakes grew out of Melinda’s hair.

  He registered everything while he charged his mount down the hillside.

  Mike pointing a gun at Rebecca. His face, by campfire, looking contorted...evil. Melinda standing beside Rebecca brandishing her crutch, as though she thought it might deflect a bullet.

  Hershal only ten feet from his granddaughter, cussing and shouting.

  Jeeter and Tom flanking him with their hands bound. Behind them Barstow working to loosen the bonds.

  Hell and damn, he needed his weapon, but all he had was a pair of fists feeling like they were on fire.

  Without slowing the horse, he tumbled off, rolled, then came to his feet in front of Rebecca and Melinda.

  He spread his arms. “Put your gun down.”

  That made Mike laugh so hard that he doubled over.

  “Didn’t expect to see you here,” he guffawed.

  “Your boss is dead,” Lantree said in case it would make a difference.

  “No need to bring him your wife alive then, is there?” The laughter left Mike in a hurry. “You kill him?”

  No one spoke.

  Tree branches scratching against each other was the only sound until...

  Faintly, so nearly inaudible that he would have doubted his senses, but for the shocked expressions on everyone’s faces, came the lovely sigh of “Canon in D” whispering through the treetops. Just when everyone recognized it, the melody was gone, leaving only the trees scratching again.

  “You owe me, Walker.” Mike went on as though he hadn’t heard a thing. Perhaps he hadn’t. Could be that this was meant for loved ones. “Smothers was going to pay top dollar for her.”

  “That deal was dead before Smothers was.”

  “That so? Reckon I’ll take my due in revenge... If I’m feeling kindly, I’ll shoot your wife between the eyes. Come to think on it, though, I ain’t. Step aside or I shoot you first.”

  Lantree spread his arms. “Never knew you to be insane, Mike, just a greedy bastard.”

  “You want to watch everyone here die before you do? Step aside or see how crazy I am.”

  The lunatic swung his pistol at Hershal. Lantree lunged at him and caught a pant leg.

  Two shots exploded at the same time. Mike’s head jerked backward. He crumpled, dead arms and legs collapsing.

  Hershal grabbed his chest, looking stunned to see blood seeping past his fingers.

  A figure appeared behind the clearing smoke of a shotgun...Johnson.

  Behind Lantree Rebecca screamed.

  * * *

  The wind moved out but the rain moved in. Lamps from all over the house had been brought to the dining room where Hershal lay, his skin without color, blanched as white as the sheet that covered him from waist to toe.

  Lantree touched his boss’s forehead, smoothed back the hair from his brow and listened to the raindrops pelting the windows.

  From wild wind to a gully washer of rain, this was not an easy land. Easy to love, though. He and Hershal had that in common...in common with everyone on Moreland Ranch.

  “Hey, old man, you got a lot to live for,” he said quietly. “Everyone’s in the parlor praying for you.”

  He took a breath and wished they were anywhere but in this situation.

  While Lantree had abandoned his profession, he had not abandoned his instruments. They lay close at hand, a reach away, sterilized and ready to be used.

  He’d gotten that far at least...the first step.

  The question was, could he take the second? Could he cut into an old man’s chest and di
g for a bullet? An old man who meant everything to him...and to Rebecca.

  He feared that he was destined to stand once more over a body, to tell the woman he loved that there was nothing he could do. This time would it be Rebecca’s eyes that changed? Would he see the affection fade from them and resentment flash hot and angry?

  “You know what to do, Lantree.” Rebecca stood beside him, scrubbed as clean as the instruments on the table in front of her. “You haven’t forgotten. Pick up the instrument that comes first, the rest will follow. Tell me what to do to help.”

  It wasn’t a matter of forgetting the steps that needed to be taken, or how a scalpel felt in his hand. He remembered how bones and muscles knit together, how and where the blood flowed, the rhythms of life...and how to heal the things that went wrong.

  He remembered it all.

  It was other memories that held him back. The sounds of those in pain, the moans of the dying and the grief of the survivors.

  And Eloise. Her strident voice publicly declaring him a failure.

  But his Becca was not like Eloise in any way. Eloise had huddled in a corner, frightened, not even willing to look up from her weeping to wipe a fevered brow.

  Rebecca looked at him with a confident smile, her eyes telling him she trusted him...that he could do this.

  If he wanted Hershal to live, he needed to put Eloise away.

  “Things are harder on the elderly,” he told Rebecca. “Even if he makes it through the surgery, it will be a long hard recovery.”

  “You’ll see him through it. I know you will.”

  He kissed her quickly. “I will.”

  * * *

  Tears streamed down Rebecca’s face when she pushed her way out of the dining room to give the news to those who had gathered in prayer.

  “The bullet’s out. Lantree is stitching him up now. He stayed unconscious through the procedure...he still is.”

  “That’s for the best,” Melinda said past the hitch in her voice.

  “I was shot once.” Tom pointed to his rib. “Was out for days. Just got a little bitty scar to show for it, now.”

  “Didn’t know you was shot!” Jeeter exclaimed.

  By the saints! All of a sudden there was admiration glowing in the boy’s eyes.