“Who are you, anyway, Prophet?” It was high noon, and they’d been riding leisurely for most of the morning, climbing gradually out of the badlands and into foothills, the air gradually cooling, drying the sweat on horses and riders. Pines and firs loomed around them on mountain slopes, and here and there they came upon ravines, deep with buffalo grass and dotted with lichen-flecked granite boulders. Prophet kept his eyes skinned for bears, as this was grizzly country.
Lola’s question had come out of nowhere, surprising him. Since their brief passion earlier, they’d been shy around each other, and hadn’t said much.
He glanced back at her for several seconds, then returned his eyes to the game trail they were following south. “Me ... I’m a Georgia farm boy,” he said, accentuating his accent. “Ah come west to make a name for m’self, I did.” He chuffed a laugh. “Quite the name I’ve made.”
“You fight in the war?”
“I was with Hood at Utoy Creek and with Longstreet at Ringgold Gap—practically fighting in my own backyard. Lost a cousin and a good many friends in both battles. Pickett’s Mill and Lovejoy’s Station took two more cousins and an uncle.”
There was a silence punctuated by the sounds of their horses breathing against their bits, squeaking saddle leather, and hooves clacking along the rocky trail. It was awkward for her to be suddenly liking this man.
“What brought you to bounty hunting?” she asked.
“Fell into it when a buddy of mine was killed in Abilene, Kansas. I’d been drinking for about three days straight, and finally went back to the cow camp. Well, ole Clay never made it back. Turned out a couple of Mexicans killed him in an alley and took his gambling winnings. I’d seen them earlier, sort of knew who they were, and I tracked ‘em down in Texas, along the Brazos, and killed ‘em both.”
He glanced at the girl to gauge her reaction, but she was staring blandly at the bobbing head of her horse.
He continued, “Well, I brought them both back to Abilene and found out they each had a bounty on them— five hundred dollars. I collected the bounty, decided that two days work for a thousand dollars was a hell of a lot easier than riding herd for thirty a month and found, and ... well”—he smiled half-heartedly—”here I am.”
“Yes,” she said dryly. “And here I am.”
“Sorry about that.”
“No, you’re not, and you know what?”
“What’s that?”
“Neither am I... any longer.”
Staring straight ahead, he smiled.
“What do you do with your money?” she asked.
“Have fun.”
“What’s that?” she called behind him.
He stopped his horse and swung around to face her.
“After the war, I made a deal with the Devil. I told ole Scratch if he let me have enough fun to forget all my armless and legless friends and family and that awful death-stink, why, I’d shovel all the coal he wanted down in Hell.”
“The Devil and Lou Prophet on the same side—Lord help us all.”
Prophet laughed.
“That’s me—what about you?” he asked after they’d started moving again.
She told him about her years learning acting from East Coast thespians, about her journey west and the unfulfilled dreams of playing in the big houses in San Francisco and Denver. About playing vaudeville and Shakespeare in backstreet taverns where the cowboys and miners and every jasper in between drank and gambled and howled, eyeing her lewdly and mouthing obscenities.
“We might as well have been reciting the alphabet as Shakespeare, for all the appreciation we got,” she griped. “But you know what?”
“What’s that?” he said over his shoulder.
“I’m going to make it big someday. Lou.”
“Lola. I wouldn’t put it past you.”
Two hours later they came to a picturesque creek flowing through a narrow valley, heavily forested on one side, grassy on the other. The black water slid almost soundlessly in its deep bed, on the banks of which Indian paintbrush and balsamroot grew thickly.
Prophet halted his horse where the bank dipped low to the water and there was a brief, sandy shore and a fallen aspen, the break charred from a lightning strike. Squirrels and mountain chickadees chattered in the branches.
“What a heavenly place,” Lola said. “Are we stopping here?”
“Why not?” Prophet said, heavily dismounting. “I don’t know about you, but my butt feels like I been straddling an anvil for seven days straight.”
“Oh, god!” Lola cried, concurring. Wincing against the pain, she climbed out of the leather. “How far do we have left?”
“Oh, about two miles.”
She looked at him with wide-eyed surprise. “Really?”
He pointed above the grassy hill on the other side of the creek. “See those two peaks up yonder—the pointy one and the one that looks like ... uh … ?”
“A breast?” she finished for him, narrowing her eyes and giving him a schoolmarm’s tolerant smile.
“Yeah, that’s the one. Well, Miner’s Gulch’s just on the other side of those.”
“Isn’t it dangerous, being this close? What if Billy sends out riders to scour the area for us?”
“He’ll be expecting us on the north side of the canyon, over there. We’re on the south side. We made a wide circle around Johnson City, which is right over there, about seven miles as the crow flies.”
She smiled at him admiringly. “You are truly a man of the country, aren’t you, Mr. Prophet?”
He smiled back. “I’ll take that as a compliment, Miss Diamond.”
“As it was meant, Mr. Prophet.”
With a sigh, he turned to unsaddle his horse. When he had the leather off both mounts, he led them down to the creek for water, then picketed them on the other side, where the grass grew so thick it slumped under its own weight.
She sat on the opposite bank, feet drawn up, watching him, liking the tall, gangly ruggedness of the man. liking the way his shoulders pulled his sweaty shirt taut across his back, liking the way he talked gently to the horses as he carefully rubbed them down with handfuls of grass. She’d never expected to fancy such a man, having favored only those men of the city she’d considered cultured. She doubted Lou Prophet had ever read a book in his life—beyond a few Bible verses as a boy.
She removed her straw hat and shook out her hair. What would her mother think? She wasn’t sure what she thought herself—only that she had found herself feeling very close to this man who had nearly gotten her killed. But if it hadn’t been for him, she’d still be running from Billy Brown, feeling like a rabbit stalked by a pack of angry wolves. As it was now—hell, she was gunning for Billy Brown!
Prophet waded back across the creek, the water rising to his waist. “I’m gonna go see what I can find for supper,” he said as he climbed the bank, heading for his shotgun. “You still have your pea-shooter, don’t you?”
“Don’t worry about me,” she said, patting her thigh.
He shook his head and walked west along the creek, then followed a twisting game trail up the mountain on his left, ducking under branches, the needle-carpeted turf crunching softly beneath his boots. Topping the mountain, he discovered a brushy cut in the valley on the other side. Descending the cut, he flushed a covey of grouse and brought down three with both barrels of the eight-gauge.
The buckshot tore one of the birds nearly in two. One was little better off. but the third bird was only winged. He chased it down, wrung its neck, and, the three birds in tow, headed back up the mountain, then down through the woods toward the creek.
Approaching their encampment, he stopped suddenly when he saw Lola’s green dress, chemise, bloomers, and pistol sheath lying in the grass near the creek. Then he heard a splash and Lola’s voice, gently chiding: “You’re back awfully soon.”
His eyes found her in the water, about thirty yards up the creek, where the bank spread briefly and the cool, black water deepened in a gently swirling pool. He spread a toothy grin.
“A gentleman would avert his eyes,” she said.
“I ain’t no gentleman.”
“Turn away—I’m bathing.”
“I’ll join you,” Prophet said, sitting down to remove his boots.
“No!”
Her protests fell on deaf ears. In a minute, Prophet had set the birds on the aspen and peeled out of his grimy clothes, tossing away his ragged underwear, and, naked as the day he was born, strode off the bank and into the water, lifting his arms and wincing against the cold.
“Good Lord—this must be snowmelt!” he shrieked.
“You just stay down there,” she ordered, petulant, only her head and neck above the water. “This is my pool.”
“Ah, that feels good!” he cooed, diving in and coming up, shaking his head like a wet dog. “Ohhh, Lordy, I needed that!”
He put his head down and splashed toward her. When the sandy bottom dropped away into the pool, Prophet dove deep, opening his eyes and watching her lovely, delicate body grow toward him, her arms covering her breasts. She turned and tried to swim away, but he grabbed her foot and pulled her back.
Resurfacing, he heard her admonishing protests: “Lou Prophet, a lady is bathing.”
“She sure the hell is!” he laughed, trying to embrace her.
She shrieked and kicked away from him, splashing, but it was only a half-hearted attempt, and in a moment she was in his arms, relaxing in his embrace, letting his lips find hers, throwing her arms around his shoulders. When he drew his lips away, she brushed water from her eyes, a coy smile working at her lovely mouth.
“Mr. Prophet, you are an ill-mannered man.”
“A reprobate.”
“An unguarded lady is unsafe in your company.”
He was nuzzling her neck, biting her ear. She giggled. He said. “Don’t worry. This cold water’s about rendered me harmless.”
She couldn’t help imagining her mother’s disapproval—her cultivated daughter frolicking in a mountain stream with a frontier bounty hunter! It passed quickly, however, and was replaced by an enormous sense of freedom and happiness, a transcendent appreciation for this big, muscular man in her arms. How far she’d come from the frightened, angry, miserable young woman she’d been less than twenty-four hours ago....
Sorry, Mother...
She reached for Prophet’s member. “Oh, my! The cold does have a rather... stifling effect.”
“Yep, I don’t think ...” He stopped as she stroked him.
“Getting better?”
He didn’t say anything. Finally, wordlessly, he pulled her to the bank, watching her breasts rise above the water, the water dripping over them in small cascades, streaming down her belly. He backed her against the sandy bank, only her upper body out of the water. She sat in the sand, the water washing over her legs. He held her arms gently above her head as he kissed her and gently spread her knees, working his hard belly between them ...
“I’m afraid, Lou,” she said.
“Don’t be afraid.”
“What if I’ve fallen in love with you?”
He looked at her. “If you have, you won’t be for long. That’s just the way it’s always been with me.”
She gazed deeply into his eyes.
“Tell me to quit and I’ll quit,” he said.
She placed her hands on both sides of his head, and covered his mouth with hers, drawing her knees up to his sides....
They made love for most of the rest of the afternoon.
When the sun had sunk behind the mountains, filling the valley with a cool, early night, Prophet built a fire, roasted the birds, and boiled coffee. They talked lazily as they ate, and when they’d finished eating, they made love again by the fire.
They lay in each other’s arms, the fire snapping and hissing beside them, shunting shadows against the forest, and he quelled her fears about tomorrow, telling her exactly how it would be and what she would do, but reminding her over and over that she had only to give him the word and they’d head to the stage station at Skowfield.
Finally, she drifted off to sleep, and Prophet lay there, liking the feel of her curled up next to him, her head on his arm, staring up at the soft night sky, the clouds drifting like smoke under the stars. It would’ve been a perfect night without the anxiety about tomorrow, his reluctance at using as bait for Billy Brown this woman he’d just made love to.
Feeling an urge for a cigarette, he gently slipped his arm out from beneath her and rose, covering her again with the blanket. He dressed in his jeans, boots, and socks, and threw a blanket over his shoulders, then retrieved his makings sack from his shirt. Taking a seat on the aspen, he plucked a paper from the canvas sack and drew a line across it with tobacco.
As he rolled and lit the cigarette and then sat smoking it, staring across the moving water reflecting the umber glow of the dying fire, he thought about tomorrow.
If Billy Brown had twenty-five men riding for him, Prophet was sure all or nearly all would be at Miner’s Gulch tomorrow at noon. Twenty-six men, including Billy himself, against one broken-down bounty hunter and a showgirl.
Prophet had to smile at that. He shook his head. He had to be nuts. All he really had on his side was his knowledge of the canyon, for he’d helped out a mining buddy there several years ago, when some silver and a smattering of gold remained, before the silver prices fell and the frequent rock slides made it too dangerous for even the most die-hard of pick-and-shovelers. Mining wasn’t his style—never had been. He liked the saddle too much, the feel of a horse beneath him, and he liked moving around too much, which was funny, since the Prophet clan had lived in the north Georgia mountains for generations.
He’d had to go and turn out the black sheep of the family.... Or was it the war that had made him restless, the memories making him run ... ?
When he finished the cigarette, he poured a cup of coffee and cleaned his guns, finishing up with the Big Fifty he’d taken from Dick Dunbar. Tomorrow, he’d need all the help he could get.
He finished his coffee, drank water from the stream, and bedded down, hoping against hope that the trap he intended for Billy Brown wouldn’t snare him and Lola, as well....